19th Century Domestic Advice Manuals
The Caroline Simpson Library & Research Collection holds a comprehensive collection of 19th century advice manuals. The majority of these handbooks were published in the UK, with some from the US and Australia. This genre of literature was often lucrative for those producing it, and regardless of the place of publication, many of these titles were readily available in Australia - brought here by immigrants or sold locally.
A number of the titles are now extremely rare; in some cases the library retains the only known copy in a public collection. The genre covers subjects such as household management, domestic service, decorating and etiquette and offers great insight into social and material histories of the home.
Guides for domestic economy
Manuals informed the ‘house-wife’ on a woman’s role within the domestic sphere: how to be domestically capable, make a comfortable home and live within one’s means.
Manuals presented the kitchen as a suitable place for middle-class women to develop skills and managerial proficiency as a key to their role as ‘mistress of the house’.
Guides for home furnishing
Titles such as Thomas Hope’s Household furniture and interior decoration (1807) had been the go-to works for advice on ‘tasteful’ home decorating among fashionable circles in the first half of the century.
By late century, a new ethos of domesticity saw home decoration as the specialty of women and this was accompanied by a growth in both female readership and authorship. The 12-volume Art at home series (1876-83), included titles such as The drawing room (1877) - written by craftswoman and promoter of home decoration for housewives, Lucy Orrinsmith (née Faulkner). Through the 1860s Lucy produced embroideries for the furnishings and decorative arts manufacturing and retail firm of Morris, Marshall, Faulkner & Company - founded in 1861 by artist and designer William Morris (1834-1896) and associates from the Pre–Raphaelite movement (1848-1900).
Guides for servants
They were published for those learning to work, and could be owned by the servant or held by households as reference books. Manuals contain material relevant to the functions of a specific role, or multiple positions required to staff households and large estates. Many go beyond advice on how to perform duties, with information on servant hierarchies, social guidance and moral encouragement.
Amongst the rarest volumes in the collection are those from the Houlston’s Guide to service and Guide to trade series. The 34-volume combined series were first released in 1838, with a number of volumes reissued around 1849. Publisher Charles Knight (1791-1873) engaged social theorist Harriet Martineau (1802-1876) to write works such as The housemaid and The lady’s maid. The series are listed in an 1854 inventory of books from Elizabeth Farm in Parramatta. It’s believed that wool pioneer John Macarthur ordered the series for his wife, Elizabeth (nee Veale). Surviving volumes are now part of the library at Camden Park House, the Macarthurs’ second property.
The Caroline Simpson Library also holds two volumes from the fourth reissue, The butler, his duties and how to perform them and The laundry maid, her duties and how to perform them
Guides for masters and mistresses
The works provide ready reference on the varied duties of male and female domestic service roles. However, they were written for masters and mistresses – explaining the specific services to expect from staff. Authors tended to come from the upper-classes. They employed Christian principles of equality, while disseminating accepted beliefs on class difference and the predetermined suitability of servants to their roles. Many writers also included advice on the ‘proper’ treatment of servants and the mistakes to be avoided for ‘smooth working of domestic machinery’. Chapters generally covered topics such as training, social relations, household scale, equipment, engagement and dismissal of servants, wages, dress, meals, & etc.
Guides for etiquette
These pocket sized volumes cover topics from letter-writing to ballroom dancing and finding a suitable spouse. Conduct books provided the aspirational with a means to understand the practices of ‘respectable’ society and they now offer insights into shifting aesthetics and social and economic changes through the century.
Most manuals were written as serious instructional handbooks, but some took the form of satirical exposés of high society. Authorship could be by ‘one of the “exclusives”’ or ‘A Lady’. In Mixing in society, 1870, the ‘the Countess of…’ asserts that ‘a standard work on manners must necessarily proceed from pen of one who moves in the best circles …’ [p.v.]