Georgian House Visit

TY visited Number 29 the Georgian House Museum 

Rory wrote: Today we went to a museum. It was an old Georgian house that had the inside (furniture, etc.) done-up to look like an old Georgian house by the Electricity Supply Board (ESB) in 1988. The house itself was originally built in 1794. When we came in we were shown a video which explained the history of the house. The video was voiced-over by an actor pretending to be the ghost of Mrs. Olivia Beatty, who was the first person to live in the house. We learned from the video that the house was on the outskirts of Dublin when it was built, which goes to show how much the city has grown since then.

Mrs. Beatty moved out in 1806. After the video, we were taken on a guided tour through the house and shown the various rooms and pieces of furniture. Nearly all the furnishings were Georgian originals; a small minority were faithful replicas. From going on the tour, I learned that affluent Georgians had servants to wait on them hand-and-foot who they called using bells that had pulleys going all over the house, that plumbing apparently did not exist in 1794 (the “toilets” were essentially commodes that had to be emptied by servants and the only sink had a hand-pump and was exclusively used for washing), Georgians slept sitting upright (they thought lying down to sleep was unhealthy), little Georgian boys wore girls’ dresses until they were eight and wealthy Georgian families hired a governess to educate and look after their children. All in all, I would say it was a worthwhile trip as it was enjoyable and I learned a lot about life in the 1800s.

                             The Georgian House

By Clara Skoog-Smyth.

  The Georgian House Museum, near the center of town, is a hidden monument to a rich and distinguished past. Within its many rooms, it holds the detail and fine architecture which makes Dublin the city it is today.

The house was previously inhabited by a woman of good birth, whose spouse went unmentioned though seven children were produced, between the times of 1794

and 1806. Mrs Olivia Beatty nee Bell was a lady of her time. She suffered hysteria and lost two of her children to fever, causing grief and unhappiness before the move to Fitzwilliam Street .

Though many of the previous artifacts are no longer there, Georgian memorabilia from around the country has replaced them, creating an atmospheric and realistic picture of the time. The house has a floor plan which is designed around the social and the custom of withdrawing. From the ornate dining and drawing rooms, to the women's boudoir, it shows a world which resembles a stage. Here one could perform in the drawing rooms, enjoy intimate chats or retire behind the scenes to adjust one's wig or bonnet. The upper classes of the city were on show to those who walked the streets, unsafe in the unlit night. Those windows which graced the crowded streets not only revealed a luxurious life, inviting pure temptation to day light robbery, by allowing the lower classes to look into their world. Rarely did the privileged inhabitants look back towards the lower classes.

 

Below, within the cellar and pantries, basic needs were attended to. Here the servants toiled. Called by the bells, fetching the water and feeding the family, watched by dutiful eyes of the housekeeper, who lived below beside the pantry, their day began at dawn and ended late at night. Above, at the top of the house the children played, slept, lived and learned, guarded by their governess, whose room was directly beside theirs. Above and below, hidden from prying eyes, two worlds flourished, entirely different from the world between and yet without these secret dimensions, the life style the family was supporting would be unreachable.

As times have changed, so have the surroundings, now in the center of the bustling 21st century. One wonders back to the day when the lady and her children waved goodbye to Number 29, Fitzwilliam Street Lower, never to return...or perhaps they have never left.

Georgian Dublin by Fareed

Georgian times in Dublin were from 1715 to 1830. During this period of time there was a unique architectural style for the houses of wealthy people.  Mrs. Olivia Beatty, the first owner of no. 29 Fitzwilliam Street Lower, who moved there with her family, governess and housekeeper in November 1794 and continued to live there for a number of years.

In Georgian times there was no running water so if a family was wealthy enough they would have it delivered to outside their home and pumped into the sink in the basement for washing and elsewhere in the house for drinking. There was no plumbing so the servants and maids would have to collect and clean the basins used as toilets in wealthy Georgian homes. Georgian beds were generally very short because georgian liked to sleep with their back straight for health matters.

Georgian mattresses were filled with straw which was sometimes rotten so bed bugs were a big problem. The beds were also high off the ground, with steps up to the mattress, to escape the dampness of the floor. They had different sounding bells for each room in the house, the servants and maids generally couldn't read or write so they had to associate each room with a different sounding bell rather than signs,with bell pulleys in the rooms of the house.

Tea was very expensive and sugar even more so. Ice was also very expensive to buy and to store in georgian times. Wealthy families had a rich diet of different meats and bread and so spices were highly coveted to preserve the foods and to give them more flavour. Wine and food were stored in the basement and cellar of the house to keep them fresh. The Governess of the house looked after the children all day and taught them their lessons such as grammar and embroidery.

Seb Dungan

The kitchen of a Georgian house is like an engine room of a ship. One of the most important tasks for the slaves would have been the lighting the kitchen fire.  The kitchen probably had an open fire at its centre, and a boiler and oven, heated by the fire, on either side.

The housekeeper did some cooking. She was trusted the owners of the house and held keys to the house. She also would have to keep accounts, and know where to buy items in the market. She got her own room.

The Georgian people lived very comfortably in Georgian houses. the men would work in the day and have supper when they got back. When supper was finished, the women would go upstairs while the men smoked and drunk and talked.