Love & Dirt: The Marriage of Arthur Munby & Hannah Cullwick - Reviews - Book Review

Contemporary Review, July, 2003

Love & Dirt: The Marriage of Arthur Munby & Hannah Cullwick. Diane Atkinson. Macmillan. [pound sterling]15.99. 365 pages. ISBN 0-333-78071-X. Ever since the publication of Arthur Munby's will in 1910, the story of his secret marriage to a servant named Hannah Cullwick has fascinated people. This fascination was increased with the publication of Munby's diaries.

In this first study of that marriage the author has used her expertise in Victorian history, and especially in the field of domestic servants, to good advantage. She reminds us that one-third of all females between fifteen and twenty-one were domestic servants. (One has only one minor criticism: clergymen should be referred to as 'the Rev Mr Smith', not 'Reverend Smith'. It is a common mistake but an irritating one in such a good book.) What was unusual was Hannah's marriage with a middle class Cambridge-educated barrister and man of letters. What was also unusual was that Hannah kept diaries of her life, that her secret husband kept his own diaries an d that he left his and her papers (including correspondence) to his old Cambridge college. We owe her diaries to her husband's influence because he had an insatiable interest in the details of her life and of the lives of other servants. It is by drawing on the rich resources of the Munby Papers in Trinity College that the author has been able to recreate the lives of Arthur and Hannah Munby and in so doing to give us a unique insight into a remarkable marriage and in passing, an important aspect of nineteenth century life. (J.M.)