Sunday 6 May 2018

Shortage of Domestic Servants

From the Illustrated London News, May 4th 1918

LADIES’ PAGE.


CONSCRIPTION for women is "in the air."  It will be cruelly hard upon thousands of people, especially upon elderly delicate parents, whose whole comfort—whose very existence almost—depends on the ministrations of young, healthy women, daughters and paid attendants.  But we must remember that nothing can be anything like so terrible as allowing the Germans to tread as conquerors our sacred soil.  It is all sacrifice, all horror, this awful war!  Lives devastated, homes broken up, the present and the future rendered dark and wretched!  It is all a choice of evils, and we must just realise that everybody has simply got to endure anything rather than see England under the German hoof and England's daughter-nations enslaved!

Meantime, however, as the call for the services of young and strong women for the State is already so heavy, the service of the homes of the country is sadly "under-womanned."  The demands of such women as remain in domestic work have grown exorbitant.  Here is a genuine reply to an advertisement for a general servant for one lady in a flat:  "My age is twenty-five, and I require a salary of £45 to £50, and all found.  Flat must not be too big, and I require a very nice bedroom.  I wear uniform in mornings only, and no caps at any time."  Many houses are quite servantless; and hospitals and asylums, too, are unable to get the domestic labour done, and wards arc closed in consequence.  National kitchens where really refined and good cooking is done may in part be the remedy; and might "come to stay."

There are in London and elsewhere "service flats," where tenants have their own furniture and private rooms, but go to a common dining-room for meals, and have their apartments kept clean by the servants of the proprietor.  In every case, I believe, these are most successful; it is almost impossible to find such a flat vacant, though the terms are very high for rent, service, and food.  The extension of this system and National kitchens may make an immense difference to women's lives in the future.  In the United States, where our present (and possibly only temporary) difficulty in getting domestic workers is chronic and of old standing, service flats—"apartment houses," as they are called in New York—are very numerous, and serve many thousands of people as homes.  Yet there are obvious objections to the system, especially in bringing up a family.

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