The servant question
May 22, 2013 9:38:04 GMT -5
Post by Deleted on May 22, 2013 9:38:04 GMT -5
Mr. Addison, Honorary Fellow in the School of History, Classics and Archæology at the University of Edinburgh, has kindly popped out for a moment in order to communicate to us the following facts:
In 1901 there were more than 1.3 million indoor domestic servants in Britain, nine out of ten of them female. The keeping of a servant or servants was one of the most significant dividing-lines distinguishing the middle and upper classes from the vast prolétariat around them. The number of servants a household could "afford" was, likewise, a very precise indicator of social status. In the Grossmiths' Diary of a Nobody, Mr. and Mrs. Pooter of "The Laurels," Brickfield Terrace, employed a single maidservant. When Mr. and Mrs. Winston Churchill set up home at 33, Eccleston Square, they did so with a staff of eight, all female except for the hall boy.
"Snobberies of various kinds were 'rampant'," declares Mr. Addison. "Factory girls looked down on country girls in service as rural half-wits. Country girls, raised to defer to the gentry, looked down on factory girls as loud, loose and vulgar."
I am with the country girls there! What about other members?
In 1901 there were more than 1.3 million indoor domestic servants in Britain, nine out of ten of them female. The keeping of a servant or servants was one of the most significant dividing-lines distinguishing the middle and upper classes from the vast prolétariat around them. The number of servants a household could "afford" was, likewise, a very precise indicator of social status. In the Grossmiths' Diary of a Nobody, Mr. and Mrs. Pooter of "The Laurels," Brickfield Terrace, employed a single maidservant. When Mr. and Mrs. Winston Churchill set up home at 33, Eccleston Square, they did so with a staff of eight, all female except for the hall boy.
"Snobberies of various kinds were 'rampant'," declares Mr. Addison. "Factory girls looked down on country girls in service as rural half-wits. Country girls, raised to defer to the gentry, looked down on factory girls as loud, loose and vulgar."
I am with the country girls there! What about other members?
