Story Search Results

The life and times of an upper class family #42

On 11th August 1863, Hugo Francis Meynell Ingram married the Hon. Emily Charlotte, daughter of Sir Charles Wood, Bart, afterwards 1st Viscount Halifax. The Woods were an old gentry family, for many centuries respectable York merchants. They were later to turn grand upon the discovery of coal beneath their ancestral estates. This was the great Barnsley field, with several hundred acres of Britain's deepest and finest coal. Sir Charles Wood was created 1st Viscount Halifax in 1866 and had a very distinguished political career. The family seats of Garrowby, Pocklington and Hickleton (where Emily was born) had been acquired by his father from the Wentworth family; t...

The Schoolroom Maid's Story

...ress, and Lady Dorothy Meynell supplied her cap.  She was the personal maid to Lady Dorothy’s eldest daughter, Dorothy, who was just four years younger than Inez.  She also looked after Dorothy’s younger sister, Rachael. The schoolroom at this time was situated just off the main Entrance Hall, and immediately below the nursery.  Inez worked under the supervision of Mrs Catt, the housekeeper, Miss Rhodes, the Lady’s maid, and the head housemaid, Rose. Her day began at 6am every day and she was so afraid of oversleeping that she kept an alarm clock under her pillow!  The first job of the day was always to clean the grate and get the fires lit, then swe...

The Schoolroom Maid's Story #34

...ress, and Lady Dorothy Meynell supplied her cap.  She was the personal maid to Lady Dorothy’s eldest daughter, Dorothy, who was just four years younger than Inez.  She also looked after Dorothy’s younger sister, Rachael. The schoolroom at this time was situated just off the main Entrance Hall, and immediately below the nursery.  Inez worked under the supervision of Mrs Catt, the housekeeper, Miss Rhodes, the Lady’s maid, and the head housemaid, Rose. Her day began at 6am every day and she was so afraid of oversleeping that she kept an alarm clock under her pillow!  The first job of the day was always to clean the grate and get the fires lit, then swe...

The Schoolroom Maid's Story #33

...ress, and Lady Dorothy Meynell supplied her cap. She was the personal maid to Lady Dorothy’s eldest daughter, Dorothy, who was just four years younger than Inez. She also looked after Dorothy’s younger sister, Rachael. The schoolroom at this time was situated just off the main Entrance Hall, and immediately below the nursery. Inez worked under the supervision of Mrs Catt, the housekeeper, Miss Rhodes, the Lady’s maid, and the head housemaid, Rose. Her day began at 6am every day and she was so afraid of oversleeping that she kept an alarm clock under her pillow! The first job of the day was always to clean the grate and get the fires lit, then sweep and d...

Hoar Cross Hall - Life below stairs #19

...k!   Lady Dorothy with her three children   By the 1920s the indoor staff had dwindled to about fourteen. Lady Dorothy and her husband didn’t really live a full social life as previous Meynell families had and there were few balls and dances and hardly any hunting and shooting. I think the First World War had a lot to do with staff cutbacks as society was changing between the wars and Lady Dorothy’s two daughters weren’t really interested in high living and parties – they wanted to do something useful with their lives. They had spent much of their childhood in the schoolroom at the Hall. The sons of the family were away at boarding school but t...

Hoar Cross Hall - Life below stairs #20

...urteen.  Lady Dorothy and her husband didn’t really live a full social life as previous Meynell families had and there were few balls and dances and hardly any hunting and shooting.  I think the First World War had a lot to do with staff cutbacks as society was changing between the wars and Lady Dorothy’s two daughters weren’t really interested in high living and parties – they wanted to do something useful with their lives.  They had spent much of their childhood in the schoolroom at the Hall.  The sons of the family were away at boarding school but the girls had a governess and nursery maid to look after them. Dorothy had her own personal maid at t...