Fiona MacDonald - Victorian Servants: A Very Peculiar History

Title Page

VICTORIAN SERVANTS, A VERY PECULIAR HISTORY

With added elbow grease

Written by

Fiona Macdonald

Created and designed by David Salariya

Publisher Information

First published in Great Britain in MMXII by Book House, an imprint of

The Salariya Book Company Ltd

25 Marlborough Place, Brighton BN1 1UB

www.salariya.com

www.book-house.co.uk

Digital edition converted and distributed in 2012 by

Andrews UK Limited

www.andrewsuk.com

Editor: Jamie Pitman

Assistant editor: Jodie Leyman

The Salariya Book Company Ltd MMXII

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Every effort has been made to trace copyright holders. The Salariya Book Company apologises for any omissions and would be pleased, in such cases, to add an acknowledgement in future editions.

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Dedication

To all servants today

FMacD

Quotes

No man is a hero to his servants.

French writer and thinker Michel de Montaigne (15331593)

Good masters and mistresses [are] quite as rare as good servants.

British actress Fanny Kemble (18091893)

A good mistress will make a good servant.

Popular Victorian saying

Ladies and gentleman are permitted to have friends in the kennel, (among pet dogs and horses) but not in the kitchen (among servants).

Irish dramatist George Bernard Shaw (18561950)

The lowest work I think is honourable in itself and the poor drudge (hard-working servant) is honourable too.

Maid-of-all-work Hannah Cullwick (18331909)

CHAPTER EIGHT: A good character

In 1879, The Times newspaper in London printed a letter from one of its readers. The writer made a suggestion that seems quite outrageous today. (To be fair, many Victorians did not like it, either.) He proposed that each servant should be issued by the police, no less with a blank book containing numbered pages. Starting on page 1, each new employer should write a character (reference) for the servant, adding extra remarks about their work, appearance, habits, morals and so on, as they thought fit.

Servants would be ordered not to remove any pages from the book, no matter what unkind, unjust or unflattering comments had been written about them. But if they did so, the numbers on the pages would show that some were missing. This would arouse suspicion in any employers mind, and make it very difficult for the servant, now labelled as a bad character, to get another job.

A real lady?

What had servants done to make people want to treat them with such distrust, as if they were criminals? Nothing in particular. The writer was just voicing, in an extreme way, the anxiety felt by the new servant-keeping middle class of Victorian Britain.

As early as the 1840s, people were making jokes about this:

[The best way to make an employer agree with the way you want to work is] by declaring that you never heard of any lady requiring whatever it may be that you have set your face against. By laying stress on the word lady, you show your knowledge of the habits of the superior classes; and as the person hiring you will probably wish to imitate their ways, she will perhaps take your hint as to what a lady ought to do.

Punch magazine, 1845

The writer is mocking sly, scheming servants, as well as snobbish middle-class employers.

Band of brothers and sisters

Later, by the 1870s, so many people wanted domestic help that servants began to make organised public demands for better treatment. These were supported by Victorian social reformers, and inspired by workers in factories and mines, who joined together in trades unions. The first servants unions were set up in 1872, in Dundee and Leamington. But the servants came from such downtrodden families, lived such isolated lives, and were so seldom free to attend meetings, that the unions did not survive. Servants had to wait until the 20th century before they won any real workers rights.

Strange but true no. 1

The Dundee maids protested because they were forced to wear a rather silly headdress as a sign of their servant status. Nicknamed the flag, it was tall and flapped above their heads as they worked. How irritating!

The maids also demanded but did not get half a day free from work each week, a whole day off on alternate Sundays, and payment every three months rather than half-yearly.

Into service

So, being a Victorian servant meant submitting yourself to a powerful employer for all your working life but, as we saw in Chapter 1, for many Victorians there was not much alternative. Picture yourself as a country boy or girl near the start of Queen Victorias reign (1837):

Its here! The day youve been dreading and, just maybe, also looking forward to. Its time for you to leave home! Your parents can no longer afford to feed you, and their tiny, crowded cottage has no room for you any more. So, take a deep breath, put on a brave smile, and wave goodbye to your childhood! Youre only 12 years old, but its time to join the grown-up world of work and worry.

Where can you find a job that will feed and clothe you and provide a roof over your head and let you save enough to send money back home to your family? Well, with very little education and no special skills, you dont have many choices. You follow your parents advice and decide to be a servant.

Seek and find

Like most other country children, youve never left your village. How will you find a job, and where will you go?

Job-hunting is a problem. There are no phones, no Internet and, even if you can read, you cant afford to buy a newspaper. Thats how some rich families advertise their needs, and well-etablished servants announce that they are looking for situations.

Put your thinking cap on! There must be something you can do!

Ask your family, friends and neighbours. Thats how most servants find employment. Isnt your aunties best friends sister a housemaid somewhere?

Beg your mother or father to get dressed in their best (their only?) decent clothes, remember their most respectful manners, and call on the butler or housekeeper of the nearest stately home.

Go and see the vicar, or, more likely, his wife. Yes, shes a bossy busybody, but she has a kind heart and likes to help the poor. A recommendation from her should mean a good start to your career.

Talk to local shopkeepers. They hear all the local gossip, and see servants or mistresses every day as customers.