Colonial housewives obviously didn’t have all the labor-saving devices we women have today to help us maintain our households. Not only do we have refrigerators and stoves, dishwashers and washing machines, vacuum sweepers, and numerous other appliances, we also have hot and cold running water in our houses and enjoy the comforts of central heating and air while doing our. Today we’re going to take a look at the lot of the farm woman in colonial times. So lace up your stays, put on your bedgown and petticoats, tie on a fresh apron, and for the next few minutes slip your feet into the shoes of a colonial woman managing her domain.
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| Colonial hearth |
You’ll quickly discover that running a colonial household requires a staggering array of skills. You’ll begin your day while it’s still dark outside, and your first job will be to build up the fire on the kitchen hearth from the live coals you carefully banked beneath ashes the night before. You did remember to do that, didn’t you? Lighting a new fire when yours has gone out isn’t an easy business, and it’s not something you look forward too. But assuming your coals are still glowing, you’ll rake the coals into several piles, depending how many dishes you plan to cook for the day, and add kindling to each to
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| Spinning yarn |
bring up a low flame. A few logs are next, while you ply your
bellows to get a proper fire going. It’s important that you know which kind of wood
is best for baking or frying and how to correctly gauge the temperature of each
of your fires for the dish you’ll prepare over it. If you intend to bake bread,
then the bake oven has to be stoked and heated to the correct temperature as
well. In the summer you’ll find the heat in the kitchen to be stifling. And, of
course, in the winter the outer edges of the rooms, where the heat doesn’t
reach, will freeze. So dress accordingly, but be very sure to keep your
petticoats away from the fire to prevent a not uncommon tragedy.
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| Dipping candles |
Cooking for the family and managing the kitchen is not the only work you’ll have to do, however. You must also feed the chickens and gather the eggs, churn milk into butter, and make cheese, grind a sufficient supply of corn into meal, and wash the laundry by boiling it in a large kettle over a fire. Of course, there’s always your large garden plant and tend. Then in the evenings you’ll want to spin flax and wool into thread and yarn on the large and small spinning wheels. After dying the yarn, you’ll be able to weave cloth on the loom so you can sew clothing for yourself and your family. And in your spare time you’ll need to make candles! If you have a tin or pewter candle mold, that will definitely speed the task. Otherwise, you’ll have to cut individual wicks, tie them to a stick, dip them into tallow, and let them dry before dipping again and again until they reach the right thickness.
A great resource for learning about the nitty-gritty of daily life in the colonial period is Alice Morse Earle’s
Home Life in Colonial Days. It’s fun—and daunting—to read through it and discover what life was really like back then. The following directions for butchering chickens, which would have been the same in the 1700s, come from the 1877
Buckeye Cookbook. I grew up on a farm and well remember my mother killing and preparing the chicken for Sunday dinner the same way—and warning me about removing the gall very carefully!
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| Colonial Dominique Chickens |
“Do not feed poultry the day before killing; cut off the head, hang up by the legs, as the meat will be more white and wholesome if bled freely and quickly. In winter, kill them three days to a week before cooking. Scald well by dipping in and out of a pail or tub of boiling water, being careful not to scald so much as to set the feathers and make them more difficult to pluck; place the fowl on a board with the neck towards you, pull the feathers away from you, which will be in the direction they naturally lie (if pulled in a contrary direction the skin is likely to be torn), be careful to remove all of the pin-feathers with a knife or a pair of tweezers; singe, but not smoke over blazing paper, place on a meat-board, and with a sharp knife cut off the legs a little below the knee to prevent the muscles from shrinking away from the joint, and remove the oil-bag above the tail. Take out the crop, either by making a slit at the back of the neck or in front (the last is better), taking care that everything pertaining to the crop or windpipe is removed, cut the neck-bone off close to the body, leaving the skin a good length if to be stuffed; cut a slit three inches long from the tail upwards, being careful to cut only through the skin, put in a finger at the breast and detach all the intestines, taking care not to burst the gall-bag (situated near the upper part of the breast-bone, and attached to the liver; if broken, no washing can remove the bitter taint left on every spot it touches). Put in the hand at the incision near the tail, and draw out carefully all intestines; trim off the fat from the breast and at the lower incision; split the gizzard and take out the inside and inner lining (throw liver, heart, and gizzard into water, wash well, and lay aside to be cooked and used for the gravy). Wash the fowl thoroughly in several waters (some wipe carefully without washing), hang up to drain, and it is ready to be stuffed, skewered, and placed to roast.”
Whew! That’s a lot of work for one platter of chicken that’s consumed by a hungry family in minutes, not to mention all the dishes the poor colonial housewife had to cook to go along with it and the cleanup involved. The difference in the amount of women’s labor when I was a child compared to what we have to do today, is striking enough. But when I think about the vastly greater work the 18th century housewife had to do—well, I need my fainting couch! As they say, a man may work from sun to sun, but a woman’s work is never done!
I’m giving away one print and one ebook copy of my newest release,
The Return, Book 2 of the
Northkill Amish series, coauthored with Bob Hostetler. Everyone who leaves a comment on this post by the end of the day tomorrow will be entered in the drawing—unless you specify otherwise—and the winner will be announced Monday morning. Tell me whether you grew up on a farm or in the city, whether you had chores as a child, and if so, which was your favorite—or not! Also please let me know whether you prefer print or ebook and include your email addy so I can contact you if you win.
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J. M. Hochstetler is the daughter of Mennonite farmers and a lifelong student of history. She is also an author, editor, and publisher. Northkill, Book 1 of the
Northkill Amish Series coauthored with Bob Hostetler, won
Foreword Magazine’s 2014 INDYFAB Book of the Year Bronze Award for historical fiction. Book 2,
The Return, released April 1, 2017. Her
American Patriot Series is the only comprehensive historical fiction series on the American Revolution.
One Holy Night, a contemporary retelling of the Christmas story, won the Christian Small Publishers 2009 Book of the Year Award.
