A Year in the Life of Downton Abbey: Seasonal Celebrations, Traditions, and Recipes (3 page)

All documents seen on the show have been made by the art department, using authentic paper and ink.

Beyond the vast, rolling grounds of Downton Abbey the political landscape is changing – so drastically that the effects are felt even in the depths of this great house. In January 1924, Stanley Baldwin’s Conservative government lost a vote of no confidence and Ramsay MacDonald became Britain’s first Labour prime minister. It was a minority government and MacDonald was, in fact, to lose the general election the following year to his old rival, Baldwin. But even so, to have a Labour government in power at all signified a huge shift in traditional British politics, where the aristocracy had ruled the country practically since a government had formed. While the socialist movement had been gathering pace since the middle of the previous century, the 1924 election proved that the winds had changed for good. The working classes were at last able to believe that it was possible for them to have a say in how their country was run (many had only been able to vote for the first time when suffrage was extended in 1919); aristocrats could no longer sit comfortably in the belief that they had a divine right to rule. Quite the opposite. It wouldn’t be going too far to say that the upper classes believed that they were under attack – certainly, this is how Robert and Violet feel.

In short, the idea that everyone knew their place in society and was happy to adhere to it had finally broken down completely. For people like Robert, Violet and Carson, the only result could be chaos. But for others, it meant hope.

However, while ideas may be changing, the practical daily life of Downton Abbey is out of step with the pace. That is, so long as Carson has anything to do with it. As the year begins, he will be keen to ensure that those matters over which he has jurisdiction will run along the same well-oiled lines he has always presided over. ‘He is struggling to keep everything the same,’ says Jim Carter, of his character. ‘He believes he is the guardian of the standards, and while he is ultimately pragmatic, the sands are shifting beneath his feet.’

So it is that, as the day begins, Carson will continue to keep his place at the head of the table in the servants’ hall, Mrs Hughes on his right, as Daisy serves the hot toast for their breakfast. Carson’s scrambled eggs are served to him by the hall boy, a youngster of fourteen or fifteen years old, in training to be a footman. The other servants – Bates, Anna, Baxter, Mr Barrow (for he must be addressed as such, now he is under-butler), Molesley and the other housemaids – are ranged around the table in strict hierarchical order, as was ever thus. The servants are fewer and the household budget is smaller in this post-war world, but Carson still does his best to maintain a pre-war air.

Despite his troubles, Carson is supported in his determination to stick to the old ways by his working relationship with Lord Grantham. For a master and his butler to be together for years was not uncommon and for many men, their butler was the one ally in whom they could confide most openly about their worries when it came to matters of the family. Husbands who did not wish to worry their wives about household budgets always turned to their butlers first. They may also have simply found it reassuring that there was someone else in charge in the house – one who knew exactly how to tend the excellent management of the wine cellar or ensure the fires were lit and the silver perfectly polished when there were guests to impress. Julian Fellowes remembers his wife’s ninety-year-old aunt sadly recalling the year her father’s butler died: ‘They had been together a long time … he was very quiet that summer.’

Spratt

Not that our friends at Downton Abbey are always perfect. The Dowager Countess, Violet, a stalwart believer in the old ways, is not such a friend of her own butler – although, perhaps, the women rarely were, preferring the confidences of their lady’s maids.

But quite apart from the fact that it was nicer at home if you liked the people you lived with, whether as employer or employee, there was also the matter of pride at stake. Lord and Lady Grantham need to remain at the top of the social ladder by ensuring any noble or important guests that come to stay are impressed by the grandeur and comfort in which they live.

For Carson and Mrs Hughes, this means putting on a good show for these guests, demonstrating their high professional standards. Part of their job is to instil this motivation in the younger servants. Those who do well will enjoy promotion, either at Downton Abbey or elsewhere. There existed an efficient underground servants’ network which passed along news of vacancies as well as gossip about any employers who treated their servants badly. The real challenge that faces our two most experienced and senior servants at Downton Abbey is that the younger generation no longer feel the same way about service as they did when starting out. It is neither the respected nor safe career it was before the war. While Carson and Mrs Hughes see their positions in an earl’s household as prestigious, the pinnacle of a successful career and most likely a welcome escape from alternative lives as a music-hall act or farmer’s wife, the younger servants are weighing up new, sometimes much more attractive options.

After the war, those who lived in the rural areas of the country no longer had to choose solely between farming or service for a career. Train travel meant that going further afield for work was not the daunting separation from one’s family that it once had been. New technology opened up exciting possibilities and those who were clever could aim to be electricians (revered as ‘men of science’) or chauffeurs. Even the women could leave and find jobs as telephonists or secretaries. Work in factories or shops, while not exactly new or better paid, was, thanks again to trains and motorcars, not quite as out of reach as it had been, with the plus that it offered much shorter working hours. These opportunities appealed to men who had fought in the war and had seen another way of life. It suited many of the big houses too, which had less money, thanks to the post-war high taxes, and had managed to survive without their usual retinue of servants when everyone was away fighting – they were less inclined to hire them all back again.

At Downton Abbey, some of these changes are being felt. There are rumblings from the likes of Thomas (though he’s the type that will always find something to complain about) and Jimmy that there must be more to life than being a servant, and even mild-mannered Alfred has gone to London to work at the Ritz, flying in the face of his family’s – and Carson’s – expectations for him. But, for the most part, even in what he considers to be reduced circumstances, Carson puts his best face on it and sticks to the routine.

Mrs Hughes (left)

Mrs Patmore (right)

Mrs Hughes’s housemaids will be up at 5.30 a.m. daily in order to get the house ready before the family comes down. Once Robert, Tom and Edith are down for breakfast, the maids move swiftly upstairs to make their beds and clean their bedrooms, before doing the same for Cora and Mary once they are up and dressed – as married women, they enjoy breakfast in bed. During the day, the maids are never seen in the public rooms by the family, but will do the remainder of their work below stairs or out of sight. The servants’ quarters also have to be kept clean. Occasionally the maids may help out at mealtimes, carrying dishes between the kitchen and the dining room.

Carson, meanwhile, will be fussing Mr Barrow and the footmen to lay the table for breakfast before they have their own. As senior servants, they are served by hall boys and kitchen maids. (Mrs Patmore’s kitchen assistants have, of course, also been up since dawn to begin their long cooking day.) Breakfast over, there will be various tasks, from polishing silver to serving coffee in the library or lighting the fires. Generally the footmen were thought to have the easiest jobs of the house, having been hired for their good looks and splendour in livery, all the better for impressing guests. The very best footmen were not only six foot tall, but exactly the same height as each other, which looked most impressive when they were standing either side of the front door.