regency | Author, Jane Lark's stories

We went to Belton House in Lincolnshire yesterday. It is a 17^th Century House with the usual tweaks made over later centuries. We did a below stairs tour while we were there.

The corridor, which I have taken a picture of, by the 19^th Century was used by both male and female servants. However women were to walk on one side and men on the other, a tradition which had passed down from earlier years when the men had a separate corridor on the right.

The rooms used by the male servants, overseen by the butler, were on the right. The rooms used by the women were on the left, overseen by the housekeeper.

In the butler’s areas were the wine cellar, the beer cellar, the silver store, the lamp and candle making spaces. While the housekeepers areas included the scullery, the kitchen, the linen cupboards, and the distillery where fruit cordials and preserves were made.

The servants did not dine together, the senior female servants – and visiting female servants – dined in the housekeeper’s room. The senior male servants – and visiting male servants – dined with the steward, who was responsible for overseeing the house and estate when the family were not in residence, and for managing it when they were.

There was a hierarchy among the servants as there was within the house. They sat at table in order of their status and the minor servants – grooms, scullery maids, etc – dined in a separate area completely.

The senior servants were even waited on, and had staff who cared for their clothes and rooms and served them. In Belton the steward had his own bell to call for service.

In the butler’s room there was also a cupboard containing a bed, where an under-butler would sleep at night in case one of the family woke and rang for service.

There is an entrance to the family chapel from below stairs. The Chapel was integrated into the house and used for morning service. The servants entrance to it opens into an area facing the altar, beneath the balcony where the family would have sat. The family would not have even seen the servants beneath them.

Below I have included some pictures of below stairs and in my next blog I will share some details and pictures of the house and a surprising fact about the chapel.

Jane Lark is a writer of authentic, passionate and emotional love stories.

See the side bar for details of Jane’s books and Jane’s website www.janelark.co.uk to learn more about Jane. Or click ‘like’ on Jane’s Facebook page to see photo’s and learn historical facts from the Georgian, Regency and Victorian eras, which Jane publishes there. You can also follow Jane on twitter at @janelark

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Recently I visited Lodge Park, in the Cotswolds, near Cirencester. Lodge Park is a 17th century grandstand.

It was built for John ‘Crump’ Dutton, a Civil War politician, for the purpose of viewing deer coursing.

It stands within the Sherborne Estate, in 18th century parkland designed by English garden designer, Charles Bridgeman.

The deer course is a mile long, and would have originally been walled.

John Dutton, and the political friends he’d brought to his estate to charm, would have ridden up the course from Sherborne House, and then in the luxury of this fully equipped stand dined and watched the deer coursing from the roof.

His lesser guests would have watched it from the balcony.

At the time it was built, from the roof he and his guests could have viewed the whole length of the course and watched their hunting hounds chase the deer into the run and follow them all the way along the course, laying bets even as they ran.

Blood sports are frowned upon these days, but in the 17^th and 18^th century they were part of life in every form, and the animals caught were eaten. There are the remains of a slaughter house at the end of the course where the venison would have been prepared for John Dutton’s table.

With my imagination rampant I can picture the idle, self-centred rich of the 17^th Century drinking, cheering and jeering and laughing as the dogs fly along the course and the deer race ahead in a leaping run, lurching from side to side, looking for escape. There was a ditch at the head of the course the deer could leap if they won.

On the map of Lodge Park you can see the fields which still outline the old deer course. They run a long rectangular length from the A420 to the slaughter house.

The fountain in the picture above is a later addition, put in when Lodge Park was once used as a family home.

And as you see, to add to the ambience of the venue, the day we visited the large hall was being used as a concert hall. I do not doubt John Dutton would have had numerous entertainments to thrill his guests and gain their influence in his political field when he owned and entertained in the grandstand.

Jane Lark is a writer of authentic, passionate and emotional love stories.