Got to the library and finally saw the original of 1939 register for my mysterious g grandmother
She was a widowed ,retired housekeeper aged 58
Other woman in house was a widowed domestic worker aged 54
As usual i looked at previous page to find any relatives and discovered another 6 women at number 12 Dynham road too
Apart from a free lance journalist all were housemaids or domestics.
This seems a bit odd to me
what do you think ?
Does the fact that it was war time make a difference. ?
Housekeeper, housemaids, domestic worker/servant etc. were all employed people working for a living.
An unpaid domestic worker on the other had was what later was called a housewife in other words a married woman who stayed at home to look after the running of
the (her own or her husband's rented or owned) house, either by doing the housework herself or by managing the domestic servants.
Don’t be mislead into thinks that every housemaid or domestic servant was employed in the house they lived in some (especially the married ones lived in a different house from the one they worked in).
The first world war changed the social structures in the UK more than the second world war which tended to have more of an effect on the work structure rather than the social structure, though both wars did of course have profound effects on daily life.
Cheers
Guy