Wet-nurses in early modern England: Some evidence from the Townshend archive

Abstract

Between them Dorothy McLaren and Valerie Fildes have pioneered the study of English wet-nursing.In her work on the parish of Chesham during the late sixteenth century, McLaren drew attention to the way in which prolonged lactation reduced fertility.Believing that most mothers understood this, she suggested that some women might have become wet-nurses in order to limit family size.'Fildes, casting her net much wider, has looked at wet-nursing from the earliest times until the present day.2In her work on the early modern period, Fildes has focused upon the Home Counties, where nursing babies from London was almost a local industry.3In particular, she has pointed the danger of confusing parish nurses, who were often themselves on poor relief and therefore not in a position to do the best for their charges, with professional wet-nurses who were usually well-paid and well- respected.4A failure to distinguish between these two types of nurse has led some historians, most notably Lawrence Stone, to associate all wet-nursing with parental indifference and neglect.5Yet despite recent research, there is still much we do not know about wet-nursing.We have an overview of the subject but little detailed information about the nurses themselves.And even where information is available, it relates mainly to professional wet-nurses such as those living in the Home Counties.6The need then is for more small-scale research, as in the following case study which concentrates on individual wet-nurses employed by a particular gentry family, rather than on wet-nurses as a *Linda Campbell, M.A., 67 Trinity Street, Norwich NR2 2BH.Quotations: all suspensions and contractions have been expanded.Original spelling has been retained but capitalization has been modernized.

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