Tracing Food Industry Forebears
Records relating to chefs, domestic cooks and kitchen maids are not always the easiest documents to find and researchers require diligence – and often a little luck – to track down details about their careers. But you may still be able to find information that could help you flesh out the working lives of those in the Victorian food industry or domestic service.
Where possible, try to locate the individual on the census and check back through each decade to establish how long they were employed in their position. Websites hosting British census records, like Ancestry. co.uk, Findmypast.co.uk or TheGenealogist.co.uk, should be able to help in the initial stages of your quest. The address given on the census could provide clues as to the type of place they worked in – a restaurant, country house, or institution. Bear in mind that many caterers and servants gained experience in a variety of workplaces – on board ships, or in military and school kitchens. Everyone needed to be fed, whether a patient in a hospital, or a duke and duchess at a fine hotel, and your ancestor may well have been the one with the skills to prepare and provide their meals.
The location of their workplace will determine your next port of call. Institutions like old hospitals, asylums and workhouses may no longer operate under their original purpose, but their staff records may have been deposited in the local history archives or record office. Get in touch to see what information they hold – the smallest snippet about an individual’s role could be the key to understanding the rest of their career.
For those engaged in domestic service in a country house or grand mansion, contact the existing estate directly to enquire about past members of staff and employment records. Larger properties taken over by the National Trust or another heritage organisation will usually be happy to help and interested to know any extra details you may have about an ex-employee. If the kitchens have been restored for public display, then you may have the opportunity to see for yourself where your forebear once worked and the type of kitchen equipment in use at the time.
Perhaps the house no longer exists but was once a significant property within the community. In this case, contact the relevant county record office to see if estate papers, documents, letters and even household log books have been added to their holdings. Historical directories can enable you to find out where now lost country homes were situated. Examples of commercial, professional, general trade and national and provincial directories for individual years can be found at www.historicaldirectories.org or at www.ancestry.co.uk– those produced by Frederick Kelly and James Pigot are extremely useful – whilst the websites of individual repositories often have online help. Shropshire Records Office, for example, provides a downloadable guide on how to research alternative sources on domestic servant ancestors at: www.shropshire.gov.uk/media/59138/24-servant-sources.pdf.
Don’t dismiss newspapers when tracking someone down. From chefs who worked in high-end restaurants to those who were employed in a local hotel, their culinary creations could well have made the headlines. Lavish banquets or dinners for visiting dignitaries could have been documented and the establishment staff may have been mentioned. Most people in catering can be highly competitive when it comes to producing a gastronomic masterpiece, so if you know that the individual you seek enjoyed a challenge, or have perhaps heard that they won awards, then turn to the newspapers for help.
Others found themselves the focus of media coverage for more negative reasons, like Alice Vokes, whose death was reported in the Daily Gazette for Middlesbrough on 21 August 1893:
On Saturday afternoon Dr J.S Walton, coroner, held an inquest at Bolton Hall, near Leyburn, on the body of Alice VOKES (33) cook. On Friday afternoon one of the kitchen maids of Bolton Hall, saw something fall past the kitchen window, and on going out, found that it was the deceased, who had fallen from her bedroom window, where she had been sitting. The jury returned an open verdict.
Even an obituary can hold clues about an individual’s culinary past. Visit the local archives in the area where your ancestor was based to discover more. There are a wide variety of searchable historic newspapers online at the British Newspaper Archive (www.britishnewspaperarchive.co.uk) spanning the period from 1710 to 1965, including over 200 local titles. Don’t forget that each county archive will also have a collection of local newspapers; copies on microfilm or original examples can provide fascinating glimpses of life during a specific era.
Wills, probate records and coroners’ reports can all provide extra detail and help to link an individual to specific places of work or name their employers and work colleagues. For example, some domestics were so highly regarded by their employers that they received bequests after their deaths. Martin Ware made his will in July 1868 and in gratitude to his household staff for the work they carried out, he left small bequests to them all when he died four years later. A sizeable sum of £50 was left to his cook Harriet Canham, whose culinary skills he must have thoroughly enjoyed!
To be distributed among Farm Labourers at Tilford £25; To servant Mary Dibden an annuity of £25; To John Beagley gardener at Tilford an annuity of £10; To Harriet Canham, cook in London £50; To James Cage coachman in London, Thomas Beagley footman at Tilford and […] Willis cook at Tilford 19 guineas; To bailiff Coppar £10; To rest of domestic servants in London and at Tilford £5.
The biggest clues, however, may lie in the possessions left behind by an individual and stored away with family ephemera, perhaps in a shoebox or suitcase in the attic. Take a good look at any letters for clues; hotel flyers and advertising leaflets from restaurants, could provide crucial lines of enquiry; newspaper clippings, old wage packets, photographs and family diaries are well worth examining in detail. A chance line written in a letter could lift the lid on a place or period of employment or even an unusual event.
Ask relatives to see if they have any kitchen items that have been handed down within the family. Now dated pieces of equipment were modern time-saving gadgets of their day and could be significant if someone thought they were worth keeping. By carefully examining these items you should be able to roughly date them to the period in which they were in use.
Finally, the Holy Grail of a cook’s treasures would undoubtedly be their recipe book, where menus were planned, much-loved dishes documented and new ideas concocted. Notes in the margins and useful cuttings that were important to the writer are not only fascinating for getting a feel for the period, but also help you to build a bigger picture of the type of food they would have been producing at the time.
The stories surrounding the lives of those who worked hard to provide food and put meals on the tables of the Victorian population are endless; it is just a case of donning your detective hat and knowing where to look!
Genealogy Websites
Access to Archives –
www.nationalarchives.gov.uk/a2a
Part of the UK archives network, the database contains catalogues detailing the archives held locally in England and Wales – ideal for pinpointing the resources available in your area.
Ancestry –
www.ancestry.co.uk
A one-stop-shop of genealogical information. Discover domestic servant ancestors listed on birth, marriage and death records, track down their changing occupations on the census, or scour online directories, wills and probate records to find out more about their individual roles.
Findmypast –
www.findmypast.co.uk
Another UK genealogy site providing a wealth of records to the researcher. As part of a long-term project to increase access to the information held in the Royal Archives, a selection of records relating to Royal Household employees have been made available on Findmypast. co.uk. These include payment and employment lists. It is also home to the British Newspaper Archive, an historical newspaper archive featuring examples from England, Scotland and Wales spanning the years 1710 to 1953 and including more than 200 local titles.
The Genealogist –
www.thegenealogist.co.uk
With an ever-growing range of data sets, this genealogy website allows users to search by occupation to locate an individual. It holds extensive collections of peerage, heritage and landowner records, especially useful if you think your ancestor worked for the aristocracy.
The National Archives
–
www.nationalarchives.gov.uk
The official archive of the UK government.
Other Resources
The National Trust (www.nationaltrust.org.uk) and English Heritage (www.english-heritage.org.uk) websites are vital for discovering more about the individual collections held by some of Britain’s most important stately homes, gardens, mills and monuments. Arrange a visit to an individual property to get a real insight into life in another era. For instance, at Audley End in Essex you can explore the kitchens where cook Avis Crocombe once worked and the restored kitchen garden where she would have sourced her fresh ingredients. The working estate of Shugborough Hall, now run by the National Trust, provides a glimpse into the world of the country house kitchen, as well as the farm where traditional skills would have been used to create butter and cheese.
More information on Servant Tax Rolls for Scotland can be found at the Royal Commission on the Ancient and Historical Monuments of Scotland website (www.rcahms.gov.uk).
Explore Emma Darwin’s Diaries: The 60 volumes detailing her everyday life between 1824 and 1896, including her recipe books, are online, at: http://darwin-online.org.uk/EmmaDiaries.html
The Museum of London website (www.museumoflondon.org.uk) provides a fantastic online resource on shopping and eating habits during the Victorian era.
Queen Victoria’s Household: Throughout her life, Queen Victoria was an avid journal writer, recording her thoughts, observations and feelings about daily events and family issues. The website www.queen-victorias-scrapbook.org draws upon some of the information from her diaries and personal correspondence, along with original source material and documents from the Royal Collections. Under the category ‘Queen Victoria’s Household’ is a photograph of the Royal Kitchens at Windsor, dating from 1878. Although sepia in tone, the kitchen looks spotless, with the pans and kitchenware arranged as regimentedly as if they were awaiting an inspection from the monarch herself.
In 2002, The Mills Archive was established to create a permanent repository for historical and contemporary material on traditional mills and milling. The amount of information collected upon this subject is extremely appealing for the family and social historian. Over one million documents and images have been rescued, enabling us to fully understand more about those who worked in this trade or merely used their services on a daily basis. By searching the mill people database you can track down workers and establish the closest mill to your ancestor’s home. Once discovered, it is fascinating to think that they would have relied upon the miller’s services and bought his flour to bake bread for their family. Find out more at www.millsarchivetrust.org
The Rural Museums Network (www.ruralmuseums.ssndevelopment.org) brings together our rural heritage through museums which concentrate upon the history and traditions of farming and country life. This site is worth a visit if you wish to find out more about the day-to-day skills and techniques used by our ancestors. By providing links to English Heritage sites, archives, indexes and societies, it offers the ideal starting point from which to find out more about your particular area of interest.