The scale & size of the job of Victorian household management was really brought home to me when I read Lord Lytteltons Daughters by Sheila Fletcher
When Lady Lyttelton died after the birth of her twelfth child her eldest daughter - still a teenager herself I think - had to take over the running of the house. When she got married, her sister Lucy took over
Granted this was an unusually large, aristocratic (though somewhat cash-strapped) family, but the job was at the very least the equivalent of being the manager of a modern medium sizes country house hotel
Related posts: Lady Frederick Cavendish The advantage of marriage
