Clara Dawson's Story

The description of a neighbouring property suggests that Castlemaine was likely to have been on three floors, with four bedrooms and a box room on the top floor, three good bedrooms and two dressing rooms, plus a bathroom with hot and cold running water on the first floor. On the ground floor, there were two good reception rooms, a smaller reception room, a kitchen and a scullery. According to the 1911 census, Castlemaine had sixteen rooms.[21] It was situated very close to the College, with the railway running along the back. The Victorian houses in the road are now selling for between three and five million pounds.​

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Clara was working for Alexander Joseph Morison, a commission merchant. In the household, at the time of the census, was Mrs Leocadia Morison and six children under the age of six, including two sets of twins. Leocadia was heavily pregnant, perhaps explaining the presence of three nurses in the home. The other servants were a cook and an under housemaid, who was Clara’s thirteen year old sister, Mary Ann, known as Polly.[22] There may well have been additional servants who lived out.

 

According to Mrs Beeton, writing in 1861, Clara was likely to have been earning between £12 and £20 a year, with her younger sister earning £8 to £12. Mrs Beeton gives detailed instructions for housemaids, outlining all their duties.

“Housemaids, in large establishments, have usually one or more assistants; in this case they are upper and under housemaids. Dividing the work between them, the upper housemaid will probably reserve for herself the task of dusting the ornaments and cleaning the furniture of the principal apartments, but it is her duty to see that every department is properly attended to.”[23]  

 

Mrs Beeton goes on to outline the many duties of the housemaid, who was expected to begin work at 6am in summer and 6.30am to 7am in winter. The first duty was to clean and blacklead the grate and lay and light the fires in winter. Next would be dusting the downstairs rooms and sweeping the carpets, having first sprinkled them with tealeaves. Mrs Beeton is specific about how this should be done,

“It is not enough, however, in cleaning furniture, just to pass lightly over the surface; the rims and legs of tables, and the backs and legs of chairs and sofas, should be rubbed vigorously daily; if there is a book-case, every corner of every pane and ledge requires to be carefully wiped, so that not a speck of dust can be found in the room.”[24]

In the absence of a lady’s maid in household, Clara would light the fire in her mistress’ dressing room and air her clothes on the fireguard. Clara was fortunate that the home had hot running water in the bathroom, which meant that she did not need to take hot water to her mistress.

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Then it was back to cleaning the downstairs rooms and the staircase.

“She should go into the drawing-room, cover up every article of furniture that is likely to spoil, with large dusting-sheets, and put the chairs together, by turning them seat to seat, and, in fact, make as much room as possible, by placing all the loose furniture in the middle of the room, whilst she sweeps the corners and sides. When this is accomplished, the furniture can then be put back in its place, and the middle of the room swept, sweeping the dirt, as before said, towards the fireplace. The same rules should be observed in cleaning the drawing-room grates as we have just stated, putting down the cloth, before commencing, to prevent the carpet from getting soiled. In the country, a room would not require sweeping thoroughly like this more than twice a week; but the housemaid should go over it every morning with a dust-pan and broom, taking up every crumb and piece she may see.”[25]

All this takes place before the household ate breakfast. Mrs Beeton gives no indication of when the poor housemaid might eat her own meals.

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As there was no footman or parlourmaid, Clara was also responsible for the breakfast table.

“The duty of laying the breakfast-cloth rests on the housemaid. Before laying the cloth for breakfast, the heater of the tea-urn is to be placed in the hottest part of the kitchen fire; or, where the kettle is used, boiled on the kitchen fire, and then removed to the parlour, where it is kept hot. Having washed herself free from the dust arising from the morning's work, the housemaid collects the breakfast-things on her tray, takes the breakfast-cloth from the napkin press, and carries them all on the tray into the parlour; arranges them on the table, placing a sufficiency of knives, forks, and salt-cellars for the family, and takes the tray back to the pantry; gets a supply of milk, cream, and bread; fills the butter-dish, taking care that the salt is plentiful, and soft and dry, and that hot plates and egg-cups are ready where warm meat or eggs are served, and that butter-knife and bread-knife are in their places. And now she should give the signal for breakfast, holding herself ready to fill the urn with hot water, or hand the kettle, and take in the rolls, toast, and other eatables, with which the cook supplies her, when the breakfast-room bell rings; bearing in mind that she is never to enter the parlour with dirty hands or with a dirty apron, and that everything is to be handed on a tray; that she is to hand everything she may be required to supply, on the left hand of the person she is serving, and that all is done quietly and without bustle or hurry. In some families, where there is a large number to attend on, the cook waits at breakfast whilst the housemaid is busy upstairs in the bedrooms, or sweeping, dusting, and putting the drawing-room in order.”[26]

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After breakfast, the housemaid’s attention turned to the upstairs rooms. This involved airing and making the beds. This was not a straightforward activity.

“Before beginning, velvet chairs, or other things injured by dust, should be removed to another room. In bedmaking, the fancy of its occupant should be consulted; some like beds sloping from the top towards the feet, swelling slightly in the middle; others, perfectly flat: a good housemaid will accommodate each bed to the taste of the sleeper, taking care to shake, beat, and turn it well in the process. Some persons prefer sleeping on the mattress; in which case a feather bed is usually beneath, resting on a second mattress, and a straw paillasse at the bottom. In this case, the mattresses should change places daily; the feather bed placed on the mattress shaken, beaten, taken up and opened several times, so as thoroughly to separate the feathers: if too large to be thus handled, the maid should shake and beat one end first, and then the other, smoothing it afterwards equally all over into the required shape, and place the mattress gently over it. Any feathers which escape in this process a tidy servant will put back through the seam of the tick; she will also be careful to sew up any stitch that gives way the moment it is discovered. The bedclothes are laid on, beginning with an under blanket and sheet, which are tucked under the mattress at the bottom. The bolster is then beaten and shaken, and put on, the top of the sheet rolled round it, and the sheet tucked in all round. The pillows and other bedclothes follow, and the counterpane over all, which should fall in graceful folds, and at equal distance from the ground all round. The curtains are drawn to the head and folded neatly across the bed, and the whole finished in a smooth and graceful manner. Where spring-mattresses are used, care should be taken that the top one is turned every day. The housemaid should now take up in a dustpan any pieces that may be on the carpet; she should dust the room, shut the door, and proceed to another room.”[27]

Fortunately for Clara, the indoor plumbing in the house meant there were probably no chamber pots to empty.

 

Candlesticks had to be cleaned and lamps trimmed, soft furnishings had to brushed. Finally Mrs Beeton says, “And now the housemaid may dress herself for the day, and prepare for the family dinner, at which she must attend.”[28] Mrs Beeton provides detailed instructions on how the housemaid should behave during dinner.

“For waiting at table, the housemaid should be neatly and cleanly dressed, and, if possible, her dress made with closed sleeves, the large open ones dipping and falling into everything on the table, and being very much in the way. She should not wear creaking boots, and should move about the room as noiselessly as possible, anticipating people's wants by handing them things without being asked for them, and altogether be as quiet as possible. It will be needless here to repeat what we have already said respecting waiting at table, in the duties of the butler and footman: rules that are good to be observed by them, are equally good for the parlour-maid or housemaid.

 

The housemaid having announced that dinner is on the table, will hand the soup, fish, meat, or side-dishes to the different members of the family; but in families who do not spend much of the day together, they will probably prefer being alone at dinner and breakfast; the housemaid will be required, after all are helped, if her master does not wish her to stay in the room, to go on with her work of cleaning up in the pantry, and answer the bell when rung. In this case she will place a pile of plates on the table or a dumbwaiter, within reach of her master and mistress, and leave the room.”[29]

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The housemaid was also responsible for clearing the table and washing the plates and cutlery. Clara, or possibly Polly, in her more junior role, may have had to wash the pots and pans if there was no daily servant to do so. She also had to prepare and serve tea. Then there was turning down the beds and lighting the bedroom fires in the evening.

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There were other tasks that were not carried out on a daily basis but which nonetheless had to be fitted into the housemaid’s schedule. Polishing brass, brushing the mattresses, polishing the floor and wiping the wainscotting (skirting boards) were weekly tasks. Spring cleaning, which was also advised in autumn, was a mammoth task. As well as a thorough cleaning, involving removing all the furniture from each room in turn and taking carpets up to be beaten, curtains and bedding had to be changed for ones more suitable to the upcoming season. The housemaid was expected to undertake minor repairs to furniture and china and Mrs Beeton helpful provides a recipe for glue for such occasions, as well as other instructions for various household products.

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Even Clara’s leisure was not her own,

“On leisure days, the housemaid should be able to do some needlework for her mistress,—such as turning and mending sheets and darning the house linen, or assist her in anything she may think fit to give her to do. For this reason it is almost essential that a housemaid, in a small family, should be an expert needlewoman; as, if she be a good manager and an active girl, she will have time on her hands to get through plenty of work.”[30]

Clara, with her prize-winning ability at needlework, would have been an asset to the household in this respect.

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There is no information about where else Clara may have worked. It could be that she worked for the Morisons from leaving school until she married in 1886. It may have been a relief to Clara to escape this regime and get married. Her future husband, Philip James Woolgar, was working locally as a gardener, probably for Dulwich College, or he may even have been responsible for the Morison’s garden. Perhaps Clara met Philip because he worked with her father. It was nearly three miles from St. John’s cottages to Dulwich College. Although that was a normal ‘commute’ at this time, if Thomas worked for the college, perhaps he would have sought accommodation a little nearer.

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Just before Christmas 1886, on 21st December, Clara married Philip James Woolgar at St. John’s Church, Penge. By this time, Philip was no longer a gardener but was working for a local dairy as a milkman. Clara gave her address as Penge and no occupation was listed, for her so perhaps she was back with her parents at St. John’s Cottages at this point. Her father and sister, Alice, witnessed the marriage.[31] Clara’s married life forms part of a different story.​​​​​​​