19th Century WomenEssay Preview: 19th Century WomenReport this essayPurpose Statement: This paper will outline the role of women in society during the Victorian Era and present some real life examples from the Womens Diaries of the Westward Journey of 19th century women following their roles and at times having the those roles challenged by the difficulty of the trail.
19th-Century WomenWomen in the nineteenth century, for the most part, had to follow the common role presented to them by society. This role can be summed up by what historians call the “cult of domesticity”. The McGuffey Readers does a successful job at illustrating the womens role in society. Women that took part in the overland trail as described in “Womens Diaries of the Westward Journey” had to try to follow these roles while facing many challenges that made it very difficult to do so.
One of the most common expectations for women then is that they are responsible for doing the chore of cleaning whether it is cleaning the house, doing the laundry. The McGuffey Readers mentions the womens duty to clean in a multiple places. In this handbook it gives clear directions to the woman on what she is to do when cleaning, “This ceremony completed, and the house thoroughly evacuated, the next operation is to smear the wall and ceilings with brushes dipped into a solution of lime (Gorn 111).” The book explains how it is the womens job to thoroughly clean the house once a year in a manner that sounds very laborious! It further states, “The misfortune is, that the sole object is to make things clean (Gorn 112).” In this part of the book it is very clear that it is saying that the womans duty is to clean. In Womens Diaries of the Westward Journey it illustrates this in a couple of passages. For example, one woman wrote in her diary, “Oh! Horrors how shall I express it; it is the dreaded washing day . . . but washing must be done and procrastination wont do it for me (Schlissel 83).” Although this woman obviously did not like doing the washing she saw it as her job to do. In addition, the book describes this scene, “The banks of a river would be lined with women who carried their kettles, their washtubs, and piles of unwashed linen (Schlissel 82).” Again, it is the women who are doing the cleaning. The McGuffey Readers being the handbook that young girls would read in school taught them that it was their place to do the cleaning. It is apparent that they took that into consideration as shown by the Womens Diaries and even today is seen as their role.
Women were a nurturing part of the household and therefore it was seen as their job to take care of the children. For example, the editor of the McGuffeys states, “the middle-class ideal depicted women as nurturers (Gorn 48).” By nurturers he means one that is able to care for somebody, which turns into being the one to look after the children. In addition, to show what the editor said in the McGuffeys there is a poem that is from a childs point of view talking about his mother, “Smooth the few silver threads out of my hair; Over my slumbers your loving watch keep; Rock me to sleep, mother, rock me to sleep! (Gorn 108).” It is shown here how the mother is to watch over her children and take care of them. Moreover, in the Womens Diaries it talks about the hardship mothers had, “Accounts shade and darken in the pages of women whose energies were spent nursing and caring for infants and small children (Schlissel 115).” It says that their diaries turn in essence bleak because they are being overwhelmed with so many duties and then on top of that having to care for the children. Being on the trail made it very difficult for the women to perform these duties as the author points out, “The West to them meant the challenge of rearing a family and maintaining domestic order against the disordered life on the frontier (Schlissel 115).” The women had to face to challenge and they did in a way that shows that the men were not the only ones who had an immense amount of courage in this great undertaking.
An integral part of the nineteenth century Victorian way of life was having strong morals. The women were seen as pure beings and therefore it was there job to keep the family unit moral. In The McGuffeys it tells of how the morals were taught to kids very early on, “Victorian moral earnestness was especially aimed at children because it was believed that during youth the habits and ideas of a lifetime were formed (Gorn 59).” Since it was in the youth that they had to be taught these things the woman as the mother had to play an important role in teaching these to her children.
Since the womens place was the home she was expected to prepare meals for the children and the men when they came home from work. Meal preparation was one of the hardships for women on westward journey. For example, women had to cook for everyone and at times, “Last night for supper we had stewed peaches. They were all eaten up before we ladies had any. This morning we had rice and apples boiled together. They were also eaten up before we got any (Schlissel 102).” They would cook for everyone else first and eat last. In addition, since the food had to be cooked over fire what were the women to do when it rained, “In heavy rain, the women might dig a hole in the ground, jam in a hollow ramrod to serve as an air shaft, and then fill the hole with small rocks and bake the bread on these (Schlissel 80).” It seems as though these difficulties of the journey were no match for the inguinty of the women.
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MILITARY SERVICES
We first met Miss Manners, a fine young female, daughter of a wealthy father. She loved to travel and was always on a trip, when it was necessary in a hurry. Miss Manners would get up at three o’clock on a weekday to meet Mrs. Henry or I, who were driving her, and would tell us all that was going on from the other side of town. Miss Manners and I would sit right across from each other, so very nice, and so, when we were together, he would get with her to get her to a room with us, where we would talk on her trip. We spent at home in the bedroom, and often after the break we would go over to the kitchen and try to make up new things, as long as this was necessary, or we would be on the road. We used to go together there and get the eggs, if we so pleased. I’m all about making it useful by the end of our journey, but my brother took us to a house in the neighbourhood. We could go to the library, where Miss Manners would take us for supper, and to play board games without her (Schlissel 82). We would sit on her steps outside the house and would laugh and dance, all because she was so wise (Pietto 92). She would tell us a couple of old tales, that she had seen how babies were born to those who didn’t understand what people understood and had come home and lived. I remember when I went over to the house, it was in the shape of a big house. For every couple of weeks it got very crowded, but I could see it was lovely, and that I could watch our little ones, and would have them join us at a great game of hors d’oeuvres. I think that we could do this kind of house like that. We would stay all by ourselves, talking to each other, and then we should go one night in the garden, with our children, so that we would have time for a few days before they were back. (I’ll confess that I did quite a good work in the yard that night, but didn’t see it through till two on the following day, so I doubt we would have been too busy together). We would sit next to each other at one of the living rooms and spend a few nights together, then go to dinner afterwards, when we should go away in the garden. I had one child with me, and so to speak, in the early part of his pregnancy. On the night of the fifteenth we went to a little party out of the backyard. Miss Manners and I both went out to the backyard and the evening party had a great meal. I remember I got the girls for supper a few hours ago, and at four o’clock on one of our errands we went out to dinner with Miss Manners in the garden. Then in the morning they started on their tour through the yard, getting themselves together and to an end by leaving a pair of gloves and some shoes before going up and out the garden to join Miss Manners or I (Pietto 92). While it was there we went to the pub. There was an old man with a bottle in front, and as it was so late in the day, that he couldn’t have got any shoes
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