All Families Great and Small
As the new series of All Creatures Great and Small has begun on UK TV I felt it was a good time to start writing in connection to the programmes. This isn’t just because I love the programme, but it is predominantly filmed in Grassington, the village where I live, along with my mother, children and grandchildren; in the TV series the village is known as Darrowby.
I have decided to try and take a person, who actually lived in the village, matching their occupation to those used by the characters in the programme.
I am hoping to find a vet, or may be recorded as an animal doctor, a housekeeper, a veterinary student, shop keeper, barmaid, schoolchild, Mrs Pumfrey equivalent etc. Grassington is also one of my One Place Studies so I will be able to add the research for these people to the study.
Let me know if you have a favourite character you would like to me to find an equivalent to in real life and I will see what I can discover.
MRS HALL – fictional cook and housekeeper in Darrowby
Elizabeth Symonds – really was a cook and housekeeper in Grassington
The 1939 Register for England and Wales [1] includes Elizabeth A Symonds who was living in Grassington, at Rose Bank, and was working as a cook and housekeeper for a widow named Eleanor Madders. This is the period of the earlier programmes of All Creatures Great and Small therefore it can be assumed that Elizabeth’s life will have been similar to that of Mrs Hall’s. Though being a housekeeper for just an older widow will have been very different from the busy household of the veterinary practice and house of Mr Farnham.
Mrs Madders was the widow of John William Madders, they had married in 1896 in the south west area of Manchester, Lancashire [2] and later moved to the Fylde coast, Blackpool [3] and then to Grassington. The home was a very large, detached property on the north west edge of the village and will have required a lot of upkeep for Elizabeth as the only housekeeper. The Madders were a very wealthy family, Mr Madders left £58,000 to his wife and daughter, Isabel Eleanor Madders when he died in 1930; [4] this is equivalent to over £3 million today. [5]
Looking for Elizabeth further back in time she is found on the 1921 census for England & Wales, [6] aged 39 years, living in Grassington. At this time, she was also a housekeeper but for a different wealthy couple, James and Nellie Raper. Mr Raper was the managing director of Issac Holden & Sons Ltd., a very successful wool combing business supporting the massive textile industry in Bradford.
The 1921 census provides a place of birth for Elizabeth which enables further research into her earlier life. Elizabeth was born 16th February 1882 in Brimington, Derbyshire, England; a coal mining area. [7] [8] Her parents were Alfred and Dorothy and when Elizabeth was 9 years old she had two younger brothers, George and Wilfred; a servant was also living with the family. Alfred was a greengrocer, perhaps his wife helped him in his work while the servant helped with the children and housework.
By 1901 Elizabeth, now 19 years old, had four more younger brothers; Alfred, William, Reginald and Lenard. However, Elizabeth was no longer living with her family, she was now a servant for husband-and-wife Arthur and Annie Blackburn in Bradford, Yorkshire. [9] At the time, the house on Grantham Road would have been in a suburb in a row of stylish terraced houses. This will have been a big change for Elizabeth, leaving her family and the coal mining landscape for a large and industrial textile town.
Bradford was an international hub for the textile industry, at the time Elizabeth was working and living in Bradford over half of England’s wool production was in Bradford. [10]
It is most likely that Elizabeth left school seeking work and the wealthy men in the mills and associated works who had moved to make their fortune in Bradford advertised for domestic servants and Elizabeth took this opportunity and moved to Bradford for work. In 1891 about one in three women between the ages of fifteen and twenty were working in domestic service. [11] There are numerous newspaper adverts ‘Domestic servants wanted’ in the Yorkshire Post and Leeds Intelligencer during 1901. [12]
What is very likely is that, through her work, Elizabeth met wealthy families in the textile industry; as they became wealthier many moved to large houses in rural areas away from the noise and grime of the city. This is probably how Elizabeth came to be working and living in rural Grassington.
While the fictional Mrs Hall worked for a vet in fictional Darrowby, Elizabeth actually was a cook and housekeeper in Grassington. I wonder if Mr Farnham will leave something in his future will for Mrs Hall; Mr James Raper left Elizabeth £200 if she was employed by him at his death in 1928, this is equivalent to almost £11,000 today so it is likely that Elizabeth stayed with the Rapers until this time and then found employment with Mrs Madders. [13]
Elizabeth’s story provides a glimpse into the history of women at the turn of the century who moved to find work in domestic service and finding themselves living a different life from the one they were born into.
References
1 1939 England and Wales Register www.ancestry.co.uk
2 England & Wales, Civil Registration Marriage Index, 1837-1915 www.ancestry.co.uk
3 1911 Census of England & Wales www.findmypast.co.uk
4 Scotland, National Probate Index (Calendar of Confirmations and Inventories), 1876-1936 www.ancestry.co.uk
5 Inflation calculator | Bank of England
6 1921 Census of England & Wales www.findmypast.co.uk
7 1939 England and Wales Register www.ancestry.co.uk
8 1891 Census of England & Wales www.findmypast.co.uk
9 1901 Census of England & Wales www.ancestry.co.uk
10 Bradford at Work: People and Industries Through the Years www.northernlifemagazine.co.uk
11 Women and domestic service in Victorian society - The History Press
12 www.britishnewspaperarchive.co.uk
13 Yorkshire Post & Intelligencer 12 June 1928 www.britishnewspaperarchive.co.uk