The ‘Ha-Ha’ is another fashionable feature of the garden. It was built to stop the animals getting into the gardens near the house and ruining them. The point was not to have any fences spoiling the view of the gardens. The owners may have had this built for practicality to prevent animals getting into the house. Alternatively, it may have been to show off they could keep up with the landscape garden fashion.
The trees in the park are arranged naturally in avenues, this frames the impressive areas of the landscape. It is showing off the countryside in its natural beauty. They owners may just like the views or just to show off their fashionable garden to guests/visitors.
The Chinese Bridge and lakes are man made, possibly to give the grounds another impressive feature. The bridge was built in the Chinese style that was very popular and fashionable at the time. The owners were most likely showing off their money and taste to better other people.
Sir John Soane built the farm in 1792. The owners would have employed a famous architect to design the farm buildings to show their wealth and that they can keep up with fashion. Farming was very fashionable in upper classes at the time the farm was built. The owners are also shown to show concern for the animals and their interest in the countryside.
The Entrance Hall is the oldest part of Wimpole Hall. There are pillars set out in the symmetrical classical style and were painted to look like marble, which shows again how the owners tried to save their money. On the other hand, the owners may not have been able to place heavy marble pillars on the floor due to their weight. Throughout the house there are many classical style features like pediments, which shows how important fashion and image was to the owners.
The most important factor to the owners seems to be fashion. Religion looks like it was more important to the servants than the owners because the writings on the owner’s family tombs did not mention religion only there achievements in life. I believe that the owners were only religious and interested in nature when it suited them or was fashionable, for example when important guests were staying at the hall.
HOW SIMILAR TO OTHER UPPER CLASS PEOPLE IN THE 18TH AND 19TH CENTURIES WERE THE ATTITUDES OF THE OWNERS OF WIMPOLE TOWARDS THEIR SERVANTS?
The owners of Wimpole Hall had similar attitudes to their servants as other upper class people, but how similar are they?
From walking around the site of Wimpole Hall, I found that the servants had to sleep in the attic above the stables. These rooms were out of the way and the visitors/guests would not have seen it. This shows that the owners of Wimpole Hall thought of their servants as a lower race as they get to sleep above animals. It may have been that they wanted their servants to have some privacy.
In the book “A Day in the Life of A Domestic Servant” by Davidoff and Hawthorn, the servants had to sleep on the kitchen floor or under the stairs in the cupboards. This shows the other estate owners were very disrespectful to their servants. From this evidence, I believe that the owners of Wimpole Hall had a much better attitude towards their servants than most estate owners. Although in Lanhydrock House, the servants slept on the same level as their owners. This may show that the owners of Lanhydrock House had a better attitude towards their servants than the owners of Wimpole Hall. On the other hand, there may not have been elsewhere for the servants to sleep due to the size of the estate or through lack of money.
According to the BBC2 video “One Foot in the Past” the owners of Erdigg used bells to summon their servants. Wimpole Hall also had the same bells (site visit) which were much better than shouting their servants. Compared to the servants at Ham House (BBC One Foot in the Past Video) who usually shared a small attic bedroom with three others, the Wimpole Hall servants lived comfortably. In addition, at Ham House the owners would always position themselves above the servants to show how much more important they were compared to them. This is a similar attitude to the owners of Wimpole Hall, although the servants only sat lower in chapel and worked below the family/owners.
The owners of Wimpole Hall had a hierarchy of servants; the housekeepers and the butler who were at the top would have better living quarters and a higher salary. This was a similar case at Erdigg according to the ‘National Trust Guide Book’
Various sources and videos of Chatsworth, Erdigg and Ham House all tell us about the plain walls, bedrooms and shared bedrooms of the servants living quarters. This shows that nearly all estate owners thought that their servants should not have decoration because it would: a) distract them from their work b) they were of lower social status.
In conclusion, I think that the various owners of Wimpole Hall treated their servants better that other estate owners. Wimpole Hall servants although treated as lower class people were given free board, food and passed down out of fashion clothes. While most other estate, owners took the cost of damaged items out of servant’s pay along with board and food. I believe that the owners of other large estates like Ham House and Erdigg treated their servants with little or no respect and were quite unreasonable and cold-hearted towards them.
HOW RELIABLE IS THE FILM ‘MANSFIELD PARK’ IN TELLING US ABOUT 19TH CENTURY PEOPLE?
The drama ‘Mansfield Park’ was originally a novel by Jane Austin written in 1814 which was made into a BBC drama film.
The film has a trustworthy reputation for realism because BBC dramas try to create accurate looks. BBC dramas are usually more reliable than ITV ones which change film endings. The BBC also have to be as accurate as possible because inaccuracies notices will result in complaints from letter writers. The producers and actors/actresses have their own ideas and interpretations of the characters, location and plot. The book had to be shortened to make it into a film that would sell. The final film could also be affected by how much or how little knowledge there is of 18th and 19th century life.
Near the beginning of the film, as the guests pull up at the front of the house, the servants are lined up outside. The guest and owners made no acknowledgement of the servants; this attitude was similar to the servants of Wimpole Hall according to a resource book for GCSE History.
The front of the house in ‘Mansfield Park’ is classical style that is being converted from Tudor Jacobean. This style was typical for estate owners of the 18th and 19th centuries.
The road leading up to the house has a central view of it. This was the same in most large estates to show off and impress the guests.
The guests are shown around the house like most typical owners would do. The viewer can see the family portraits on the wall. From a site visit at Wimpole Hall, I can tell this aspect is reliable.
The chapel was inside the house that is like Wimpole Hall. The chapel in ‘Mansfield Park’ was not looked after and was Gothic style. The characters did not come across as religious, which is very unreliable. At Wimpole Hall, the chapel as looked after and had lots of money spent on the trompe l’oiel style. The owners of Wimpole Hall always took care to have their chapel in the latest style.
In the garden of ‘Mansfield Park’, the trees are lined in avenues to frame impressive aspects of the landscape; there are man-made lakes, which is typical of the 18th and 19th centuries garden fashion.
The BBC2 video “One Foot in the Past” showed how the servants had hidden doors and passageways. These could be noticed in ‘Mansfield Park’ and shows that this film is accurate.
The characters of ‘Mansfield Park’ were dressed accurately. The women were wearing bonnets and Tudor style dresses; the men were wearing smart tuxedos. These were similar to the outfits worn in the paintings at Wimpole Hall and in pictures of ‘A Day in the Life of a Domestic Servant’ by Davidoff and Hawthorn.
I think that ‘Mansfield Park’ is a reliable source because most aspects of the film are very similar to Wimpole Hall and other sources. There are some differences but I think this is just because different households in the 19th century would vary like household do today.
HOW USEFUL IS WIMPOLE HALL IN TELLING US ABOUT RELIGIOUS ATTITUDES OF THE TIME COMPARED TO OTHER SOURCES?
Wimpole Hall tells me that the owners were religious in most aspects but not in some areas. People living in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries were not very religious, if they were truly religious it was obvious. There was a revival of religion in Britain; the Methodists split from the Church of England in the 1780’s. The Methodists later split into smaller churches, Primitive Methodists and Free Methodists who wanted even stricter worship. One of the aims of the Evangelical Movement who stayed inside the Anglican Church was to change the slack ways of the senior clergy and upper class people. A significant amount of Anglican churchmen broke away from the Church of England to join the Roman Catholics in the 1840’s. Then in 1850, the Roman Catholic hierarchy was re-established in Britain after the Reformation and was allowed to have Bishops and Archbishops. This upsurge of religious feeling in Britain meant that there was a definite improvement in religious attitudes.
Going to church before the religious revival was seen to be a social event among upper classes where they could show off their wealth through their clothes and carriages. Wimpole Hall has a Chapel inside and a Church outside which suggests that the owners were religious because not many houses had both these features on their estate. The owners had a beautiful mural painted on the chapel walls of “Adoration of the Maji.” This “trompe l’oeil” style was very expensive which shows us that the owners were trying to either make it look beautiful for God or again to show off their wealth. I deduce that this second point is more likely because the buildings in which the painting is set is not stables and barns but is a Roman temple to match the décor of the painted pillars.
The church and chapel of Wimpole Hall cannot tell us many things about the previous owners such as; what type of Christians they were; who took the services; how often the services took place; and how many people and who attended. To get this information I would have to look at other sources like diaries and church records.
The marble monument in the church is of the Earl of Hardwicke who is holding a bible and cross. This could suggest that the owners were very religious. The writing on the tomb tells us that the owners were not religious because it is all about the Earl of Hardwicke’s life achievements and not how religious he was. Evidence suggests that there was not a bible to be seen around the house, they only had bibles in the church and chapel.
The National Trusts Wimpole Hall Guidebook (pg34) tells us that chapels were not built for religious purposes but for fashion. The Duke of Chandos had a chapel built that was designed by Gibbs; Lord Harley then had one built and kept an orchestra there.
An extract from the Diary of Queen Victoria’s Maid of Honour explains there was only servants at the chapel for Morning Prayer.
“ You may imagine what a general rush there was, and how horrified poor Lady Hardwicke felt, to think that the Queen should have walked in and found nothing but the servants.” This extract also tells us how Lady Hardwicke then laughed which shows that the owners could not have been religious if she did not even feel ashamed or reason for the family’s absence.
The video ‘Mansfield Park’ tells us that religion was not seen to be important. The women were astonished when a man decided to become a clergyman. They suggested that he should be something more respectable like a lawyer. This evidence can tell us that religious ways were almost disapproved of by the upper classes.
Services became more relaxed as time went on. “…attended services every Sunday. But they were more casual than they had been in the past.” (COOTES – Britain since 1700). This tells us that religious attitude was becoming almost non-existent. This is similar to the information gathered from other sources. An extract from the Cambridge Chronicle 1843 states a completely different view. Her Majesty and the Prince are said to have a strict routine around the time of the chapel services.
In conclusion, I believe that Wimpole Hall is the most useful source to tell us about many aspects of religious attitudes at the time because you can look for yourself and deduce facts by your own interpretations. Wimpole Hall is not useful to find out information like when the services were held and who attended, which could prove helpful in finding out about religious attitudes at the time. With sources out of newspapers and diaries, you can not be sure that the information shown is not biased and you can not look at both sides of the story. The most helpful sources other than Wimpole Hall are books on religion in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries are books written by the National History Trust who are most likely to have accurate information.
