Did women live alone in the 1800amp;#39;s? If so, how did they go about earning money and living in general? -

Sometimes they did, usually not. The way women lived had as much to do with the social class and milieu than with their gender. Genteel women probably would not have lived alone, unless they were genteel old maids (who usually had fallen a few social rungs since they were young and marriageable). Genteel women were supposed to live at home if they had living family who could take them in. A young heiress who was still of marriagable age would have been expected to hire a elderly female companion to act as her chaperone. Families were generally obligated to support widows and spinsters, but the situations of these women were often difficult because people were sometimes reluctant to provide for them and more eager to provide for their own families. It was considered a massive step downwards in the social ladder for more a genteel woman to work and the only professions generally open to them were governess, tutor, writer, and later on, for more middle class girls (particularly ones who were poised between girlhood and marriage) teacher, and telephone switchboard operator. The situations of working class women were much more irregular. the number of children born out of wedlock was remarkably high. Women, out of necessity, might live in irregular situations with other girls or with their boyfriends without the benefit of marriage. They idea that women stayed home until married existed for working class women but economic circumstances made it less common and enforced as it was for upper class women. For poor women, respectable occupations such as seamstress, maid, and factory worker existed as well as more dubious ones like prostitute. It s important to acknowledge that life was different back them. People had a much better chance of dying prematurely, which meant that people were often widowed and remarried. Families were large because there was no birth control. For every confinement there was a 2% chance of death in childbirth, higher if there was no trained attendant. There was no social safety net (other than the church and the workhouse) and the level of public education was dubious. Generally, things were better in the US as opposed to Britain, because the American economy was based on the family farm and British economy based on factories. Those living on family farms generally ate better with better quality food and more humane working conditions. Supposedly, according to military records of the American Revolution, the average height for white males was about the same as it is for white males in the US today.|::::|Single women generally lived at home with their families, but some did live away from home. In america, in the early 1800s, the public school system employed many women as schoolteachers, and some went out west for instance. They would normally board with a family. They were paid very much less than male teachers so it was quite hard for them to be independent. Single women lower down the social scale might work in factories or in domesic service. If they worked in factories they would still probably live at home, but if they were in domestic service they would very often live in the house of their employers. From the mid-1800s, opportunities for work for women expanded quite a lot. Nursing became a respectable job for women from the 1850s, and many women began to be employed in office work. The invention of the typewriter created many jobs for women, as it was found that women were better typists than men. A lot of women were employed as sales clerks. The library service employed a lot of women, and women worked as telephone switchboard operators. Some women entered the medical and legal professions. In most cases though, single women would continue to live with their families. Living on their own was not seen as a particularly desirable option for young women in the 1800s. If women were teachers in boarding schools, or college professors, then they would live in their schools or colleges during term time of course. But generally the assumption was that a single woman would continue to live at home.|::::|The latched onto men in the same way that a small parasite would latch on to it s host. They didn t need money or to earn a living ; men were satisfied both those needs for them.|::::|Some did if they could not find a man. A woman who found herself in this sorry condition would have to work for a living.|::::|They worked in crumby factory jobs for a fourth of what men earned.