The Girl’s dormitory was arguably – according to the Guide – the most probable Girls Dormitory. The Guide said that ‘there were probably up to 60 Girls’ sleeping in the Dormitory. However, there were only 15 beds; although according to the Guide, one row was removed for safety reasons. The Guide also said that the Greg’s, may have flouted the law, having two, maybe three, sometimes to a bed.
The beds shown in the room were not the actual beds, but rather 1980’s replicas. According to the Guide, however the beds were accurate replicas, based upon markings on the wall.
Where evidence was lacking, with regards to the Girl’s room, it was made as a typical, Girls Dormitory. The quilts and pillows were filled with straw. Straw was also kept in the room, as were bedpans, the girls would have probably, according to the Guide, would have been locked in.
Also, hanging from the ceiling are various Herbs. These were typical of the period. The Herbs were used to improve the smell and help kill Lice.
We are also told from Sefton’s account that ‘our rooms were very clean the floors frequently washed…The rooms were aired every day’. This is now done in the apprentice House today.
A definitely modern addition is the staircase, leading up to the Girl’s room. This was added for Health and safety reasons. According to the Guide, there would have been a ladder put up to, and taken away from, a hatch so that the children could be locked in. This was probably so, that they could not escape.
The Guide said that what is now the Doctor’s room was probably ‘probably one of the Boy’s rooms’. This is, because according to Priestley, the Boy’s slept in Dormitories, opposite the girl’s: ‘the girls on one side of the house and the boys on the other’. According to the Guide, although the room is small, it would only have housed a relatively smaller number of boys. This was, because Mr Greg thought that boys were more troublesome and needed extra room.
The room existing today, is based upon what Doctor Holland’s, would probably have looked like. For example, according to his Doctor’s notebook on October 13th, he says, ‘have six leeches applied…apply to a blister’. From this we know that Dr Holland used such remedies as Brimstone and treacle, to promote diarrhoea.
The Doctor’s room, like many others at the apprentice House, is only a typical Doctor’s room. According to the Guide, it was only meant to illustrate the fact that there was a Doctor. The Guide said it is much more likely that Doctor Holland just brought his equipment and set it up in the corner of a room. The people were ill just visited him.
In the doctor’s room at Quarry Bank there is a bed, though the Guide said that there would probably not have been a bed, it was just to show that very sick Children would have been taken out of work.
The Doctor’s room, as aforementioned, serves to show us how the Doctor would have worked. From this we can see what sort of treatment the children would have received.
Another room that is just as unreliable to people looking for evidence, of the Apprentice house, is the superintendent’s quarters. According to the Guide, this was probably not where the Superintendents lived. Evidence of this includes the size of the room. It is quite small. According to the Guide, they may have lived in another part of the house – which is privately owned – or they may have lived in their own house, elsewhere. This seems likely, as it is doubtful that they would have wanted to live, right with the children. Most of the Superintendents were couples and many had their own families. It seems unlikely that they would have, necessarily wanted their own children mixing with Apprentices.
It is more likely that the Superintendents quarters, was perhaps a lesser workers room, as it had heating – there was a fireplace. It is improbable that any Apprentices would have lived in the room, because it is on the ground floor.]
It serves more to show how they would have lived. Apparently the room has been fitted in accordance to what the superintendents would have been paid. The Guide described it as ‘comfortable living’. It had colourful rugs, reasonable furniture, and wall painting and so on. All of the props were ‘of the period’. The furniture has been acquired from antique shops, as were the paintings on the wall. This room is the most decorative, of the workers, reflecting the Superintendents status.
The room also has other luxuries, such as tea, sugar and china cups. It is a typical room for someone of their status.
Perhaps the most reliable room is the Kitchen. It can be said with quite a degree of certainty, that what is now the kitchen was the original Kitchen. This suggests that when it was built, it was actually the Kitchen. Furthermore, it is in the most likely place, as it is at the back-side of the house.
The Kitchen is also set out in a very likely way. There is a Kitchen garden outside. Inside the Kitchen on the table is food from Quarry bank’s own Kitchen garden, which, according to the Guide, grows the same sot of Herbs and vegetables now, as then. Also, the room is very smoky, adding a more realistic atmosphere to the room.
Joseph Sefton mentions that they ‘used to dine on thick porridge,’ as a result, there is porridge on the scrubbed table. The modern-day Kitchen is a typical Kitchen of the period, in the probable setting of the original Kitchen and using evidence from the Apprentices who lived there. Because of this, it is a very reliable secondary source for those looking to use it as evidence.
As aforementioned, the House’s Kitchen garden can, rather accurately, show us what supplemented the apprentice’s diet. However, other more miscellaneous things can provide evidence, to how they lived. There is a water pump, outhouse and water bucket, to give us a good idea about what would probably have gone on. With the case of the water pump, we can assume that it was pre-existing to the renovation.
Although the Apprentice House today, probably looks little like it would have in terms of layout, to what it would have looked like; the evidence shows that it is fairly matched, in terms of the reliability of evidence. Even though, most of the evidence, particularly the props, is not from the actual apprentice House, the majority of it is of the period. Or at least, it is a modern replica using all of the evidence available. So, the Apprentice House offers quite reliable evidence, as a secondary source, of how the Apprentices would have lived.
