No Job for a Little Girl

Ceinwen was fourteen years old when she was sent away to work in 1932: "My father saw me off... I was sobbing my heart out as soon as the train left the station. One woman wanted to call him, to fetch me home. I nearly broke my heart, I did. I’d never been to London. I didn’t know what to expect, did I? And I swore that if ever I got married, my children would never do it. Never! They would never skivvy for anybody else…"

No Job For A Little Girl gives vivid voice to the experiences of Welsh women like Ceinwen who went into domestic service between the two world wars, by allowing them to tell their own tales of duty and drudgery, of household hierarchies and harassment. Their story is heard here for the first time thanks to the painstaking oral history research undertaken by Rosemary Scadden, who has dedicated herself to the task of recording and interweaving the testimonies of these women.