Servants: The True Story of Life Below Stairs. Part 2 of 3 - Class War

This part of the story looks at how servants began to organise against the class system. Although the documentary is dispelling the romantic view of servitude offered by some popular television series it does feel as though it may be tip toeing around the title topic of 'Class War'. For example, one might think the publishing of Das Kapital in English in 1887 might have been worth a mention. It is great though at presenting a view of female class struggle, a topic which too often goes without attention.

[anarchist]

In a few places this documentary talks about the "philanthropic" upper class "gifting" places of work. The language of the narration seems to favour the terminology of the controlling/owning classes perhaps a little too often for comfort.

Workhouses are almost presented as youth hostels with apprenticeships but Rudolf Rocker's Anarcho-Syndicalism (1938) paints a very different picture:

The new law [Poor Law of 1834] took the provision for the maintenance of the poor out of the hands of the parish authorities and put it under a central body appointed by the state. Material support by money or provisions was for the most part abolished
and replaced by the workhouse, that notorious and hated institution which in the popular speech was called the "poor law Bastille." He who, smitten by fate, was compelled to seek refuge in the workhouse, surrendered his status as a hu-
man being, for those houses were outright prisons, in which the individual was punished and humiliated for his personal misfortune. In the workhouses an iron discipline prevailed, which countered any opposition with strict punishment.

Everyone had a definite task to perform; anyone who was not able to do it was deprived of food in punishment. The food was worse and more inadequate than in actual prisons, and the treatment so harsh and barbarous that children were often driven to suicide. Families were separated and their members permitted to see one another only at stated times and under the supervision of the offi-
cials. Every effort was directed to making residence in this place of terror so unendurable that only the utmost necessity would drive human beings to seek in it a last refuge. For that was the real purpose of the new poor law. Machine production had driven thousands out of their old means of living — in the textile industries alone more than 80, 000 hand weavers had been made beggars by
the modern big plants — and the new law saw to it that cheap labour was at the command of management, and with it the possibility of constantly forcing wages lower.

Under these horrible conditions a new social class was born, which had no forerunners in history: the modern industrial proletariat. The small craftsman of former times, who served principally the local demand, enjoyed comparatively satisfactory living conditions, which were only rarely disturbed by any considerable shock from without. He served his apprenticeship, became a journeyman, and often, later, a master himself, as the acquisition of the necessary tools of his trade was not dependent on the ossession of any great amount of capital, as it became in the era of the machine. His work was worthy of a human being and still offered that natural variety which incites to creative activity and guarantees inner satisfaction to man.

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[ohmeowzer]

Those poor people worked so hard I'm sure many died young ..of exhaustion..I'm a RN and I thought my 12 hour shifts were horrible..God Bless those dear souls

[vivien]

yes, i may have to do my own cooking and cleaning and worry about making ends meet every month, but DAMN am i ever grateful to be alive in this era. i feel so bad for our ancestors.

[CDN]

Watching this series makes me grateful for my life circumstances. It grieves my heart to think people were born only to live in misery and work themselves to death.

[Neutronia]

My grandmother was a housekeeper, when she was young in the early 1930's, to a doctor and his wife. The doctor was a gynae and she told me that all these upper class women would come for treatment of STI's and to have terminations, all on the quiet of course.

[rochellelower]

I wonder how many of us still feel like servants in our jobs. It still goes on.

[cheriefrench]

This is the period when England started selling children from the lower classes, workhouse, to other countries. Girls to Australia, Boys to Canada. They didn't stop to Australia until 1967. My grandfather came to Canada as an indentured slave on a farm at age 10. He refused to ever visit England again.

[bluebell]

My mother is a housekeeper and cook. The members of the household treat her very well and think of her as a second mom. So glad things are so different nowadays for people in service!

[solokom]

30:15 when you see these old gravestones and hear the list of names and when she says "they didn`t leave the home to start a new life, their life ended there" - man that is one of the saddest things I heard in a long time.

[lindagarrido]

My great-grandmother was a servant in Spain, and her wealthy employer the father of my grandmother. He provided for her and even paid for her education in a convent school. But I can't imagine how humiliating it must have been for my great grandmother and the wife to live under the same roof with this man for 20+ years! When my great grandfather offered to legally recognize my grandmother and give her his family name she refused. Despite all that, my grandmother kept in touch with her half sisters, but refused to talk to her father.

[jodyjohnsen]

I was raised on a farm in rural Maine. To me it is a peek into what I expect domestic service must have been like. I had to feed the pigs morning and night. That meant carrying a 5 gallon bucket of slops 200 feet through rocks, rain and snow to the barn up the stairs and into the pen. I weighed 68 pounds when this started. The bucket weighed 42 pounds. My memories of struggling to get the bucket along the stairs were entirely painful. Then there were dishes to wash (it took hours because little kids see no end in sight) then peeling potatoes, scrubbing vegg, etc. When it was time for school I was the first one out the door. Not surprisingly, I did very well in school excelling in math going on to study accounting. After school the animals, dishes and vegg peeling continued. This was my life until I ran away at 16. It’s not the same as service because this was my family but I tell myself I had a miniature look into a life I escaped via education.

[Deliapiano]

This series is fascinating and at the same time horrifying. Those poor servants. Yes, they were given a place to live and food to eat. But they had no life of their own. It was a form of slavery. I am surprised your great grandmother survived as the 'all purpose' housekeeper. She obviously quit at some point. I don't think servants were allowed to marry and continue their work afterwards. I think you did a wonderful job with your research. There is so much history that isn't taught in schools, yet deserves to be remembered. This is an example. Thank you for your efforts. Kind regards, Delia

[RenegadeTimes]

Yes the sisters dressed like the girls but the girls weren't allowed to beat and abuse the sisters. The girls weren't able to stop the priest abuse. These laundry houses were bad for the young women no matter how one desires to explain them. They were horrid.

[ActionableFreedom]

The hostess is absolutely excellent in everything. What fantastic narration.

[judithhuling-cadieux]

In the United States, where my Great Grandmother came from Sweden to be with her husband. She was a maid, cleaning the homes of the wealthy. My Grandmother would go to work with her mother, and learned how to be a Maid as well. Love the great documentary, BBC is great. Thank you!

[sohailchoudhury]

Respected Professor Pamela Cox:

You are an encouragement to lot of people as I can see in the comment section... You are TRULY doing a great work... You are an institution... A one (man) ARMY... No words to express my gratitude🙏

With profound regards,
Sohail Choudhury

[DoveAlexa]

So they just glossed over how one girl was sent to a penitentiary for having been raped by son of the master she had to do everything was asked in order to stay employed? For this 'crime' she had to work almost the worst job possible all while being told it was for the good of a soul that was tainted through no fault of her own? The people in this doc just seemed to take this 'soul cleaning' narrative for granted.

Go watch the movie The Magdalene Sisters if you want to know what this was really like, and who it was really for.

[sarahhall]

My great grandmother, started as a kitchen maid at Chilham castle for the Stanhopes rose to be a ladies maid before marrying great Grandfather who was a railway signalman but then became a policeman and finished up as a private detective. 🙂

[rebeccahopkins]

Jack London wrote a book based on a time he disguised himself and lived among the very poor in London?? WOW. I had no idea. Jack London is also the author of “The Call Of The Wild”. A very famous, widely acclaimed and honored book now considered an important classic in American literature.

[MK-wtnj]

A brave heart that never despairs...how very, very sad to have that as the best you can hope for😢