How To Find Your Laundress Ancestors

Census returns and other records can reveal more about the life of your hard-working forebear

Many of our poorer ancestors were laundresses, while the more wealthy may have run laundries. The occupation is usually indicated in census returns as “Laundress”, “Laundry worker” or “Washerwoman”, although you may also see “Goes out washing”, “Takes in washing at home” or “Washing and charring”. Later censuses may add qualifying details such as “Laundress servant”, “Steam laundress” or “Head laundress domestic”. Where the address is an ordinary residence, your ancestor presumably worked from home or at local premises, but institutional addresses

including workhouses and orphanages would suggest laundress inmates or residential staff.

Hospital, infirmary and other institutional papers sometimes mention laundry employees, and many laundresses are named in the records of Sun Fire Office, an insurance company founded in London at the start of the 18th century, while some indentures for apprentice laundresses survive (see Focus On, page 63). In addition, some laundresses left wills and letters, and copies of their bills may be held in regional or specialist archives. Search discovery.nationalarchives.gov.uk.