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What was an 'Out floor servant'?

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  • What was an 'Out floor servant'?

    I decided to look back through the census records to find out when Anthony & Anne Mulligan first came to England. They were my GGGP's. In 1851 they were agricultural labourers in Caistor but they had a lodger who was an Out floor servant. The census reference is HO 107 2114, she was called Nancy Durkin and by the looks of things came with them from Ireland.

    It maybe I have misread the entry, but if I am right, what was she?

  • #2
    Could it be an " outdoor servant" perhaps..?

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    • #3
      I was just about to say the same thing, Barbara!
      KiteRunner

      Every five years or so I look back on my life and I have a good... laugh"
      (Indigo Girls, "Watershed")

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      • #4
        Originally posted by Just Barbara View Post
        Could it be an " outdoor servant" perhaps..?
        Possible, but what did they do as opposed to calling them an Agricultural labourer?

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        • #5
          Great minds eh!

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          • #6
            Outdoor servants were not farm hands, they might have worked with the family pigs etc, or in the garden

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            • #7
              If she was their lodger and her occupation was outdoor servant, it sounds as though she worked for a different family, not the people she is listed with on the census. Maybe she worked for the same employer that they worked for, though.
              KiteRunner

              Every five years or so I look back on my life and I have a good... laugh"
              (Indigo Girls, "Watershed")

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              • #8
                I thought the difference was that ag labs had their own accommodation and were free to clear off if they wanted to, whilst an "outdoor servant" was hired by the year and lived with the farmer's family.

                OC

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                • #9
                  Yes O.C. but they seem to have done slightly different things, and also I've noticed that certainly in Britain, that outdoor servants seem to have been more likely to be female.

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                  • #10
                    Just checked the image - looks like Out Door Servant to me. The D in Door is the same as the D in Durkins.
                    Sarah

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                    • #11
                      Ag labs lived out in their own homes, (sometimes in a tied cottage, the property of their employer.)
                      Farm servants lived in, either with the farmer, or with the hind.
                      Farm servants might be indoor - housework, dairy, stables, pigs etc.
                      Or outdoor - they worked on the land or around the yard.

                      Sounds as if your lady lodged with the couple (perhaps same employer) and worked outdoors, as above.

                      Jay
                      Janet in Yorkshire



                      Genealogists never die - they just swap places in the family tree

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                      • #12
                        I've also seen 'outdoor labourer' for an elderly, widowed lady who according to another source (an extant letter) survived by doing the vicar's garden. She still lived in the same cottage she had when her husband (an agricultural labourer/parish clerk) had been alive. So some outdoor labourers did not lived in tied cottages!

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                        • #13
                          My lady is in the 1851 census but neither Anne or Anthony are present in 1851 and Nancy isn't present in subsequent censuses. Wonder if she got married, died or even went back to Ireland. After 1851 the house where they were living started filling up with assorted offspring.

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