‘meddle’ in politics. Her allies in this need for information might be relatives, particularly unmarried aunts or cousins, who can usually be relied upon to trade gossip when they’re visiting. Or she writes to them regularly, as well as corresponding with the other aristocratic wives in her circle: this kind of networking is also particularly useful when it comes to hiring new servants.
So there it is – a highly decorative hostess, interior decorator, Lady Bountiful dispensing charity to the poor and big-budget party planner. Throw in the travelling and the unending social pressure to behave in a certain way at all times and you can see that behind all the luxury and show, this is a complex role. And there is little real privacy. With so many people around at her beck and call, even her private life can be subject to intense scrutiny. Which might not be a problem if, like Cora, Duchess of Grantham, her marriage is a happy one, a fact well known and discussed below stairs. But if, like some aristocratic wives, her relationship with her husband is a starchy, formal affair, a merger purely for financial or status reasons and very ‘hands off’, (there’s no divorce, of which more later), rather than envy her elevated role you might wonder how she copes with it all.
T HE S ERVANT R OLES
Each individual job in the pecking order is very clearly set out and compartmentalised. This way, the lower servants can hone their skills over time. Essentially, the older staff teach the younger ones – who have the most harsh, menial and unrelenting workload. In fact, the learning curve means the younger lower servants sometimes have to wait on their senior co-workers. It also means they can pick up the nuances of the household itself. They may not have face-to-face contact with the people they work for, but they still need to be familiar with their whims and fancies.
Not everyone who goes into country house service sees it as ‘a job for life’. Here are the four different types:
The servant who spends their entire life in service.
The servant who wants the country-house lifestyle and regards it as a stage before marrying (on average, women in service marry at around the age of 25, and have worked for around l2 years in 3–5 different jobs).
The impoverished, genteel, educated woman (think Jane Eyre), usually a governess or housekeeper, forced to find paid work because of a change of circumstance in her family’s fortunes.
The local ‘casual’ worker or labourer.
T HE U PPER S ERVANTS
THE BUTLER
The butler is the highest-ranking servant in the house. He has total responsibility for all the male staff in the house and is, effectively the ‘team leader’ of the servants – and the right-hand man of his master. He is respectful – but never subservient.
He’s in charge of the wine cellar, the arrangement of the dining table, the announcement of dinner and, with the footmen, the serving of all meals and wine. It is the butler’s job to carve the joint of meat and remove the silver covers from the dishes. It is also his job to check that lamps or candles are in working order and that the fires are glowing. At the day’s end he is the person who checks that all doors and windows in the house are locked.
He is responsible for all the family silver and all the arrangements for the reception of guests. Immaculate in appearance, discreet in the extreme, he is superbly well organised; his key priority in life is his boss and the family.
He is on call 24/7 and is the person who has most to do with the people ‘upstairs’. Usually a bachelor (his bosses prefer him not to be distracted by a life of his own), he has worked his way up the servant hierarchy over time, so the butler’s knowledgeable authority over his male underlings is never questioned.
He has his own suite of rooms, usually as near to the main living rooms, usually the dining room, as is practical. Being so close means that
So there it is – a highly decorative hostess, interior decorator, Lady Bountiful dispensing charity to the poor and big-budget party planner. Throw in the travelling and the unending social pressure to behave in a certain way at all times and you can see that behind all the luxury and show, this is a complex role. And there is little real privacy. With so many people around at her beck and call, even her private life can be subject to intense scrutiny. Which might not be a problem if, like Cora, Duchess of Grantham, her marriage is a happy one, a fact well known and discussed below stairs. But if, like some aristocratic wives, her relationship with her husband is a starchy, formal affair, a merger purely for financial or status reasons and very ‘hands off’, (there’s no divorce, of which more later), rather than envy her elevated role you might wonder how she copes with it all.
T HE S ERVANT R OLES
Each individual job in the pecking order is very clearly set out and compartmentalised. This way, the lower servants can hone their skills over time. Essentially, the older staff teach the younger ones – who have the most harsh, menial and unrelenting workload. In fact, the learning curve means the younger lower servants sometimes have to wait on their senior co-workers. It also means they can pick up the nuances of the household itself. They may not have face-to-face contact with the people they work for, but they still need to be familiar with their whims and fancies.
Not everyone who goes into country house service sees it as ‘a job for life’. Here are the four different types:
The servant who spends their entire life in service.
The servant who wants the country-house lifestyle and regards it as a stage before marrying (on average, women in service marry at around the age of 25, and have worked for around l2 years in 3–5 different jobs).
The impoverished, genteel, educated woman (think Jane Eyre), usually a governess or housekeeper, forced to find paid work because of a change of circumstance in her family’s fortunes.
The local ‘casual’ worker or labourer.
T HE U PPER S ERVANTS
THE BUTLER
The butler is the highest-ranking servant in the house. He has total responsibility for all the male staff in the house and is, effectively the ‘team leader’ of the servants – and the right-hand man of his master. He is respectful – but never subservient.
He’s in charge of the wine cellar, the arrangement of the dining table, the announcement of dinner and, with the footmen, the serving of all meals and wine. It is the butler’s job to carve the joint of meat and remove the silver covers from the dishes. It is also his job to check that lamps or candles are in working order and that the fires are glowing. At the day’s end he is the person who checks that all doors and windows in the house are locked.
He is responsible for all the family silver and all the arrangements for the reception of guests. Immaculate in appearance, discreet in the extreme, he is superbly well organised; his key priority in life is his boss and the family.
He is on call 24/7 and is the person who has most to do with the people ‘upstairs’. Usually a bachelor (his bosses prefer him not to be distracted by a life of his own), he has worked his way up the servant hierarchy over time, so the butler’s knowledgeable authority over his male underlings is never questioned.
He has his own suite of rooms, usually as near to the main living rooms, usually the dining room, as is practical. Being so close means that
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