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Image of A Vicar's Wife in Oxford, 1938-1943

A Vicar's Wife in Oxford, 1938-1943

Patricia Malcolmson, Robert Malcolmson

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The diary of a clerical wife during the Second World War provides fascinating insights into life at the time.

The diary of a clerical wife during the Second World War provides fascinating insights into life at the time. War had an impact on even genteel civilians in unraided cities like Oxford (though safety was never assured), among them Madge Martin (born 1899), wife of the vicar of St Michael at the North Gate, Oxford. Her pre-war life, full of travel, theatre visits, walks, books and films, was jolted into very different realities: she found herself undertaking more housework (by 1943 she had lost both her maids), volunteering with the Red Cross, and housing her two sisters' families, who self-evacuated at different times to Madge's home to escape London's air raids. Her private diary, engagingly and accessibly written, discloses much about her thoughts and feelings and social relations; some tribulations (she endured serious and frequent headaches); and her ambivalences concerning her role as a parson's wife. It shows both the persistence of comfortable, established lifestyles and necessary adaptations to theconstraints of existing in wartime. It is presented here with notes and introduction. PATRICIA and ROBERT MALCOLMSON are social historians with a special interest in Mass Observation, women in World War Two, and Englishdiaries written between the 1930s and the 1950s.

Format:
Hardback
Pages:
292
Publisher:
Oxfordshire Record Society
ISBN:
9780902509740
Published Date:
20/9/2018
Dimensions:
234mm x 156mm
Weight:
1g
Category:
20th century history: c 1900 to c 2000

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RRP: £25

Format: Hardback

ISBN: 9780902509740

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