Historical society

A FASCINATING insight into the lives of women in domestic service during the 19th and early 20th centuries was given by Annie Williams at the society’s February meeting. Drawing on research undertaken in north Wales, she exposed the grim reality of loneliness, degradation and exploitation in this hidden world.

Opportunities for women were severely limited in the late 19th Century and domestic service was by far the largest source of employment. In 1871, out of a total of 3.7 million working women in England and Wales, 1.25 million were servants. There were few opportunities in aristocratic houses where duties were highly stratified. In Anglesey in 1830, 23 people owned 67 per cent of the land on estates such as Plas Newydd, Baron Hill, Henllys, Gwredog and Penrhos. Some were holiday homes which retained a skeleton staff of low level kitchen and scullery maids, recruited locally, whilst skilled servants such as cooks and ladies maids, recruited in England, moved around with the families. English was the lingua franca - a problem for native Welsh-speakers and families did not employ local women in higher roles for fear that they would spread gossip. At Plas Newydd, only one woman, a laundry-maid, had a Welsh name. At Plas Amherst in Harlech, there were none. In middle class homes domestic servants were classed as “maids of all work” and despite their low status their duties were manifold and exceedingly onerous. From 6am until midnight seven days a week they combined most, if not all, the roles of the entire staff of the aristocracy – except for dusting the ornaments in the drawing room with which they were not trusted!The most likely option for local girls in working class households was general servant and when their families were struggling they started work at a very early age. As with most domestic staff they were required to live in – often in squalid conditions. Employers had absolute control their over servants and carte blanche to dismiss them instantly without a character reference, vital to find another position. The law often added force to this, as in the case of a young girl who asked her employer’s permission to visit her dying mother. When this was refused she absented herself and the court upheld her employer on the grounds that “she had defied a master’s lawful command.” After 1890 things began to change. New opportunities began to emerge for women through education and in employment such as clerks and shop workers and in factories. The pre-war Liberal Government introduced social legislation regulating working hours and duties and the National Insurance Act of 1911 provided sickness and unemployment protection to low paid workers such as domestic servants. During the first War women were employed in munitions factories and other civil occupations. All this led to a growing shortage of domestic servants and a great debate in the press about the “service problem.” After the war, many women were forced back into domestic service. In 1931 over a million women were still employed in this occupation, 23 per cent of occupied females. Over 800,000 continued to live in their employers’ homes, in lonely isolation from their families.