Media: BOOK - paperback, 232 pages
Author: A. Emm
Year: 2019
ISBN: 9781526730138
Other: b&w photos, bibliog, further reading, index
Publisher: Pen & Sword

Everyone has a mother and a line of female ancestors and often their paths through life are hard to trace. That is why this detailed, accessible handbook is of such value, for it explores the lives of female ancestors from the end of the Napoleonic Wars in 1815 to the beginning of the First World War.

In 1815 a woman was the chattel of her husband; by 1914, when the menfolk were embarking on one of the most disastrous wars ever known, the women at home were taking on jobs and responsibilities never before imagined. Adele Emm's work is the ideal introduction to the role of women during this period of dramatic social change.

Chapters cover the quintessential experiences of birth, marriage and death, a woman’s working and daily life both middle and working class, through to crime and punishment, the acquisition of an education and the fight for equality. Each chapter gives advice on where further resources, archives, wills, newspapers and websites can be found, with plentiful common sense advice on how to use them.

Contents:
Preface
Note on Money
Acknowledgements
1. Birth, Marriage and Death
 - Birth
 - Marriage
 - Death
2. Education
 - Mills
 - The Part-Time System/Half-Times
 - Sunday Schools
 - Workhouses
 - British and Nations Schools: Monitorial Schools
 - Church Schools and Parish Schools
 - Ragged Schools
 - Schools of Industry/Industrial Schools
 - Elementary Education Act 1870
 - Board Schools
 - Upper and Middle-Class Education
3. Crime and Punishment
 - Prostitution
 - Lock Hospitals
 - Contagious Diseases Act
 - Vagrants, Hawkers and Costermongers
 - Infanticide and Baby Farming
 - Punishment
 - Places to Visit
4. Daily Life
 - Housing
 - Illness
 - Leisure and Recreation
 - Cost of Living
 - Maps
 - Photographs
5. A Hard Day's Work
 - Labour Laws
 - Trade Unions and Strikes
 - Finding Employment
 - Apprentices
 - Pay
 - Servants
 - Beerhouse Keepers, Publicans and Licenced Victuallers
 - Cottage Industries - e.g. Lace Making, Straw Bonnet Making
 - Dressmakers/Seamstresses/Milliners
 - The Land
 - Mill and Factory Workers
 - Nurse and Midwife
 - Post Office and Telegraphists
 - Shop Keeper and Shop Assistants
 - Theatre and Music Hall
 - Washerwoman, Laundress and Charwoman
 - Trade Directories
6. Emancipatioon
 - Enfranchisement
 - Suffragists and Suffrafettes
 - Electoral Registers and Burgess Rolls
 - Teacher Training
 - Teachers' Union
 - Universities
 - The Professions
 - Business Women
 - Civic Duties
 - Welfare Communities and Good Works
 - Dorcas Society
 - Clothing
 - Places to Visit
Timeline
Index

Reviews:
"... For those struggling to track the women on their family trees, or wanting to flush out their lives more, especially in the 1815-1914 time period when so much was changing for women, it is an invaluable resource." - portion of a review by Paul Milner, MilnerGenealogy.com