The Country Maid Companion Blog Part Eight - Victorian Seaside Jollies

Part 8 of The Country Maid has hit supermarket shelves. This time, we’re leaving Norwich for a Victorian day out at the seaside.

Despite Lady Marchant’s threat of dismissal, excitement thrummed in Grace’s chest at spying a blue ribbon on the horizon.

Around the 19^th century, many fishing villages and towns in the UK were searching for new sources of income outside of the fishing seasons, especially when herring and cod numbers started to dwindle. Enterprising locals offered holiday excursions to people living in cramped, smog polluted cities and towns. Breathing in fresh sea air and ‘taking the waters’ via mineral enriched baths became the go to cure for ill health, particularly conditions such as tuberculosis.

One example of a fishing industry expanding into tourism is Southwold in Suffolk. The town's failing salt works managed to survive longer than expected by offering salt cures to health-conscious Victorians. Nowadays, the town is most well known for its 620 feet pier, posh gift shops and Adnams brewery (And you’ll be seeing more about Southwold in my soon to be released serial with The People’s Friend. Check my X feed for updates on how far along I am :D)

However, at the start of the 1800s, a trip to the beach was only in reach of the upper classes, who could afford to take time off and acquire transport to these locations. Without railway lines being laid down in the mid to late 1800s, cheaper fares and the Bank Holiday Act of 1871, a daytrip to the coast would have been impossible for ordinary people.

As The Country Maid is set in the 1850s, the only chance Grace would have of seeing the sea is while serving the Marchants on their holiday.

Cromer actually became a full-fledged coastal resort in 1877 when the railway line finally reached it, but during the events of the story trains only reached as far as Great Yarmouth. The Marchants prefer a more secluded holiday and so chose somewhere the masses can’t quite reach yet and went the rest of the way by carriage.

Cromer remains one of the top summer holiday destinations in Norfolk. I remember childhood trips of walking along the pier with a melty mint choc chip ice-cream, running around the beach with a bucket and spade, using up all my 2ps in the penny pusher machines in arcades and a fish and chip dinner eaten in the back of the car on the way home to Norwich.

A Victorian child’s beach trip would have been quite similar, including fishing for crabs off the pier, a penny lick stuffed with ice-cream, donkey rides, watching a Punch and Judy show, and stuffing their face with fish and chips. A lot of our beach traditions originate from the Victorians.

As usual, the Victorians had rules on how a respectable person should conduct themselves on these daytrips. Men and women were kept separated on the beach… but a male bathing costume only became mandatory in 1860. Nude bathing for men was the norm, something which Finn Marchant quickly embraces much to his mother’s embarrassment.

Norwich Heritage has a fascinating collection of pictures featuring Victorian holidaymakers: Cromer in Victorian times. Norfolk fishing villages and seaside resorts of the past

The bathing machine Grace and Rebecca clamber into was a changing room on wheels, which was led by horses into the sea. These vehicles allowed women to dangle their feet in the water out of view of any men. Some ladies even hired an older, stronger woman to lift and dunk them into the sea for a bracing dip.

Bathing machines could either be bare bones or quite fancy, with shell decorations, a vanity table to ensure the lady looked presentable before she stepped outside, and a bench to recline on if the excitement became too much. Even Queen Victoria had her own personal bathing machine.

They could also be death traps. Women could end up going too far out and encountering difficulties, as seen in a case in Great Yarmouth in 1871. In my The People’s Friend short story, Surprise at the Seaside, the heroine nearly comes a cropper when the horses attached to her bathing machine bolts.

Bathing machines faded into obscurity after they fell out of favour in the early 1900s, but they can still be found. The horses have been untethered. The wheels removed. Many bathing machines were recycled into the beach huts dotting our shores.

Disaster strikes during the holiday and Grace gets swept up in it as usual – will she get back to Norwich safely?

(Series Breakdown)

Part 8: Worried about losing her job, Eliza is unable to get excited as the Marchants prepare for a coastal holiday in Cromer. The family and servants arrive at the town and, while Finn is quick to dive in, Rebecca refuses to leave her bathing machine… Although I’m now going to start hiding spoilers for later parts as things are going to get interesting ;)