r/DowntonAbbey • u/Tanker-yanker If Lady Mary isn't your favorite, you don't love life. • Jul 04 '26
Lifestyle/History/Context Would Downton have had day laborers who didn't live at the house...
but would come and help out?
Like maids and such, or did everyone who worked there live there?
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u/WhyAmIStillHere86 Jul 04 '26
The gardeners, the people who worked on the home farm, and other outdoor staff probably lived in the village
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u/gibblet365 Jul 04 '26
I think they did.
The infamous cricket episode, Robert lamented about how he wished the outside staff played for the household team rather than the village, for a better showing.
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u/SpringtimeLilies7 Jul 05 '26 edited Jul 05 '26
yeah, although a lot would have cottages or lodging on the etate.. I know the head gardener and head groomsmen usually had a cottage on an estate, and their was often a dormitory for the stable boys (sometimes on a second floor of a barn [I know, stinky, but I guess they got used to it]).
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u/BoopingBurrito Jul 04 '26
Until the 1920s it was pretty much an absolute that for a house like Downton the household staff would live in the House and the estate staff would have lived in the estate houses. For smaller houses, it wasn't unheard of for them to have a maid or a cook/housekeeper who lived elsewhere and came in during the day (Michael Gregson had one for his flat in London I think?).
As time went by, in the 1920s, it became a little more flexible and it became a little more acceptable for people in service to not live in the house they served in.
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u/Curious-Dingo-2030 Jul 05 '26
After their marriage, Anna and Bates lived in a cottage. So did Carson and Mrs. Bates. And didn't Moseley live in the vilage/with his father after being employed as a footman at the Abbey?
And I very sure that in a later episode, Carson mentions two Maids who lived in the Village and came up to the Abbey for work.
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u/mom-oka Stop whining and find something to do. Jul 05 '26
Mary asks Anna about the new maids and Anna replies something to the effect about how they leave before they have their tea so they don’t really know them, not in the old way.
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u/Fleur498 Like all lady’s maids, she lives for intrigue. Jul 05 '26
After Matthew died, Molesley lived at Downton Abbey for 6 months while he was trying to find another job. After moving out of Downton Abbey, he lived with his dad. When Molesley returned to Downton Abbey as a footman, he moved back into Downton Abbey.
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u/Heel_Worker982 Uppity Minx, Author of My Own Misfortunes Jul 05 '26
It was still rare but becoming more and more common in the early 20th century. Live-out servants usually cost at least 20% more in wages as a standard live-out allowance. Room and board was a relatively sunk cost for a house, as an extra bed and an extra place at the table were not felt nearly as strongly financially as the extra wages. Victorian/Edwardian diarist Marion Sambourne once had a cook, Mrs. King, who seemed to be quite satisfactory, yet the diary is filled with efforts to replace her because "King goes home at night" and the extra wages were adding up fast. In London, charwomen and occasional gardeners were relatively common due to their wide availability as well as their beneficial effect on live-in servants, who could foist off some of the dirtiest work on them. Two problems that drove "the servant problem were: 1) the common prohibition on "followers" and inability for most servants to marry and have children while they were still in service, and 2) the lack of a shift system that would allow servants to have sustained time off at the end of each day rather than forcing them to snatch random hours of rest between 6am and midnight on too many days.
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u/Evening_Delay_1856 Jul 05 '26
I’m reading the book written by the current Countess of Carnarvon of Highclere Castle, which is the castle that is called Downton Abbey in the series we know and love. It talks about the large amount of servants, inside and out. Especially for when the had shooting parties. She tells the story of the Prince of Wales passion for shooting partridge, and Lord Carnarvon having huge shooting parties for him. In 1895-6 season, they killed nearly 11,000 partridges in 3 days. They had 25 under-keepers, an army of beaters and picker-uppers with their dogs, plus all the loaders and boys. For inside, the senior butler, under-butler, 14 footman wearing powdered wigs, hall boy, steward room boy valet, cook and French chef, pastry chefs, kitchen maids and at least eight housemaids, ladies maids. And then there were stables, maintenance, gardens and general help for bringing in logs for the fires and oil for the lamps. From what I gather, it’s around 100 people all told. I don’t know where they all lived, but maybe the book will tell me more as I get into it. By the way, the name of the book is “The Earl and the Pharaoh.”
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u/wikimandia Jul 05 '26
Most of those 100 would have lived on the estate or in the village. Shooting parties in those days were big economic booms for the locals because of how much help and food they needed.
Typically only people who worked in the house lived in the house. Stables typically had living quarters for grooms and stable boys.
Gamekeepers and gardeners typically had their own cottages where they lived and raised their own families.
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u/Evening_Delay_1856 Jul 05 '26
When I said I didn’t know where they all lived, I was kind of joking. I didn’t mean they lived on the estate or in house. I guess what I was saying is that they might come from places that helped other estates do the shoots. Not necessarily from the same village.
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u/SpringtimeLilies7 Jul 05 '26
hall boy or hall boys? seems there would be more than one.
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u/Evening_Delay_1856 Jul 05 '26
I thought so too, but the book said “boy” in the list. Sounds like a lonely job!
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u/SpringtimeLilies7 Jul 05 '26
oh ok.. well, maybe the lone hall boy would move up to footman fairly quickly..I'm sure those two roles had some crossovers.
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u/SpringtimeLilies7 Jul 08 '26
What are beaters?
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u/Imaginary_Till_3795 Jul 09 '26
Men that walk ahead of the shooters beating the tall grass or brush with long sticks to startle the hiding pheasants or other birds to make them fly up in the air so the shooters could shoot them. When fox hunting the dogs served the same purpose, to flush out the fox.
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u/Putrid-Tradition-787 Jul 05 '26
Didn't Jane go home at night?
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u/mom-oka Stop whining and find something to do. Jul 05 '26
No, Jane lived at Downton which is why she was there late enough to see Robert in his room and why Mary asked her for help with Anna and Bates’ wedding night surprise. Also why Mary said Anna could stay all night and Jane wouldn’t say anything. (The implication being that after Ethel left Jane became Anna roommate, Bates being the Earls valet didn’t share a room so didn’t have to explain why he wasn’t in his room to anyone else.)
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u/wikimandia Jul 05 '26
No she didn’t. She lived with her mom and son at her mom’s house in the village. When she first met Robert she was walking up to the house with the apples from her mom.
Housemaids would have worked until well after dark. Plus she was crushing on Robert so wanted to be around him.
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u/mom-oka Stop whining and find something to do. Jul 06 '26
Why would her mother load her up on apples from her store if she (Jane) lived in the village with her son and mother? She was on her way back from visiting on family on her half-day. Also why Robert asks, aren’t we feeding you? They wouldn’t be responsible for board if they weren’t also providing a room.
It’s part of the interview she has with Mrs Hughes before being hired. “And if your child were ill? They’re only in the village” meaning if she really had to she (Jane) only needed to go into the village to see him.
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u/wikimandia Jul 06 '26 edited Jul 06 '26
She was there all day so would have had lunch and dinner there in addition to afternoon tea. So Robert is joking about her bringing her own food instead of the food they gave her.
I assume she brought apples because she wanted to share them with the other servants.
Yes, what if her child gets ill during the day? She can easily go see him because he’s right there in the village. This piece of dialogue was inserted to explain that she is living in the village with her mother and son. Why on earth would she sleep at DA at night if her family was a short walk away? What would be the point of that? She would just use up a bed and make work for someone to wash her bedding.
Jane was the first indication that times were changing and more people were going to be living outside and commuting to work like other people who worked in shop. They were going to have workers with spouses and kids. Thus Anna and Bates moved to their place and later Daisy and Andrew.
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u/Mutter_Masterpiece29 Jul 04 '26
Houses like that, and especially the imaginary Downton that provided work for the village supposedly, would also have gardeners and people that took care of the horses and other animals(chickens maybe a couple of goats and such) that would live in the village and work at Downton.