Pets in Diaries at Hampshire Record Office

Today almost half of British homes contain at least one pet animal. A recent survey found that eighty-nine percent of owners considered them to be part of the family. Although people have had pets for hundreds of years, pet-keeping as we know it today didn’t emerge until the nineteenth and twentieth centuries.

Jennie Gauntlett Hill and her cat, Trix, ref 130M82/52-p26.

I’m part of a team of historians from Royal Holloway and Manchester Universities and we are working on the first large-scale research project on the history of pets in British family life in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries.

As a part of the project I’ve been exploring the archives at Hampshire Record Office and trying to find out how people in the past thought and felt about their pets.

There’s an abundance of evidence for animals in the home. Photographs, albums, personal writings, letters, and many other sources brim with references to pet animals. These include dogs and cats, but also more exotic creatures. You can read more about them here.

One source that we’ve become particularly interested in is peoples’ personal diaries. Diary keeping, the daily practice of recording one’s activities in a journal, grew in the nineteenth century and became more popular in the twentieth. Printed diaries were marketed to the masses – and as well as using these to record scheduled events, many people used them to record their daily activities.

Writing a diary could be quite arduous – many people gave up after a few years or even just a few months. But those who persevered have left behind them a unique historical record that can give unprecedented insight into the daily life of the writer.

Diaries are especially valuable for our study of pets – as they show the moment a pet was acquired and where it came from, they often record the involvement of the animal in daily activities, and they can show how people cared for animals, the food they prepared for them and when they were taken to the vets. Most of all, however, they can give us a unique insight into the emotional connections between humans and animals over time.

One particular diary from Hampshire Record Office that we have used extensively was kept by Jennie Gauntlett Hill, the daughter of a smallholder with some private means. Jennie was born in 1906 and her brother Vincent (known as “Sonnie”) arrived two years later in 1908. Her parents were English but the family lived in the United States until returning to England in the 1910s.

A portrait photograph of Jennie Guantlett Hill, ref 130m82/53/30.

When Jennie was twenty the family were living at Brambridge Cottage near Eastleigh, and it was at this point that Jennie began to keep a diary.

The diary tells us about Jennie’s daily affairs and activities – and importantly for us, the family’s relationship with animals. There was a dog called Guess and a cat called Tip, as well as guinea pigs, chickens, ducks and a working horse called Hamlet.

We hear about her close relationship with Guess, how she frequently took him on walks in the surrounding countryside. On February 21 1926 she wrote: After tea took Guess for a run with the bicycle. Great excitement over a rabbit!

She was quite a lot less attached to the other animals on the small holding – the chickens and ducks were eaten without much thought.

Hamlet and Guess, ref 130M82/51-p12.

But she did feel some sadness when Hamlet, the old horse, was sent to the slaughterhouse in 1927. But she recovered instantly and excitedly, writing: It all seems to point to having a baby Austin car!

Jennie continued to keep her diary and if we jump ahead ten years to 1936 we find that the family have moved to ‘Hethersett’ at Otterbourne near Winchester. Sonnie had died in the late 1920s and so Jennie was now living alone with her mother and father. At this point the family were keeping ducks, some budgies, a dog called Tim and in 1937 a neutered male cat, Trix, arrived.

Thirty-year old Jennie was beginning to feel rather tied to home. She had previously persuaded her parents to allow her to take a driving course, and after much cajoling had got them to agree to her taking on part-time work at Slades, a local garage in Winchester. This was an unusual choice for a young woman in the 1930s and suggests she had quite a strong drive for independence.

But in 1935 her parents insisted that she spend less time at the garage and help more at home, which she reluctantly did. She had formed a close relationship with one of the garage proprietors, Herbert Slade, but she was still able to see “Erb” as regular walks with Tim provided a good excuse to roam the local countryside.

The 1930s was also a period in which pet ownership became more difficult for Jennie. When Trix had to be put down in December 1938 she was distraught: Feel quite ill, it is such grief to me. Everywhere reminds me of him & his dear, funny little ways. I can’t get over the loss. Oh, I miss him so. Poor little fellow. I suppose I loved him too much, but he twisted me round his little claw. 15 Dec 1938.

Jennie and Trix, ref 130M82/52-p26.

This incident is presented in very strong emotional terms – there’s a marked contrast here with the rest of the diary. Prior to this the most distressing period of Jennie’s life had been the decline and death of her brother in the late 1920s – and even this was accepted with more stoicism and less apparent upset than the loss of the treasured cat.

Jennie’s extreme reaction to Trix’s death may explain why she does not seem to have acquired another pet of her own for some years. But there is also a break in the diary during the war years. During this period Jennie was a driver for the RAF and was often away from home – there seems to have been less time for diary writing, and she may have focused on letters instead.

The diaries pick up again in the 1950s and we find that Jennie and her mother are still living together at ‘Hethersett’ – her father having passed away in 1944. Jennie had a male cat called Teddy and in 1959 they took on another male, a tabby called Tibs, from a neighbour who was moving away.

Jennie’s mother and Tibs, ref 130M82/55-p25.

Jennie was now fifty-three and working in a local bakery – a job that was often very demanding. In 1959 it was decided that her mother, now eighty-nine, was too old to be by herself at home during the day, and Jennie gave up her job to spend more time at home with her.

At this point, the diaries become more focused on Jennie’s home and domestic life, and we hear more about her relationship with the cats.

Teddy was her favourite and she often writes about playing with him. On Tuesday January 6 1959 she wrote: A rainy day & both cats sleepy – Teddy & “Tib-Tibs” are real pals and have great fun romping round the house.

Cat care took up quite a lot of time. She purchased meat for them, usually chicken or rabbit, and prepared it for the week on Saturdays. On Sunday the cats were given a regular treat – skinned prawns or tit-bits of scampi.

It was often quite a challenge to get Teddy into the house at the end of the day. On Friday January 5 1959 she wrote: Teddy very naughty stayed out until 9.40 pm – very worried & searching for him.

The cats frequently needed medical treatment. They were regularly dusted with flea powder. Teddy had problems with his eyes and Jennie had to get him a special ointment. Tibs also suffered from digestive problems, re-occurring diarrhoea, and had to be put on a special diet.

Nonetheless they were fundamental to Jennie’s sense of home. On July 5 1959 she wrote: Both boys glad to see us back. Tibs went to mother, & Teddy came to see me – bless them.

Photographs of Teddy and Tibs “the boys”, ref 130M82/55-p13. 

Yet looking after the cats, and paying the vets bills for Tibs, put a strain on the small household. In 1961 Jennie records that she had an argument with her mother over the future of the cats. Her mother had made her promise that Tibs would be put to sleep on her death (perhaps because of the prolonged veterinary treatment) and Jennie subsequently said she would do the same for Teddy.

Jennie’s mother died in October 1964 and about a month later Jennie fulfilled her promise. The diary entries that follow suggest that she found this very painful to bear. In November she wrote:

Felt exhausted & weak after a bad night, & the dreadful desolate feeling of loneliness without the boys. Miss Teddy frightfully, & cannot help weeping with overwhelming sorrow. It’s almost more than I can bear, not to see my darling about, & to love him in my arms.

As with Trix two decades before, it is striking how much more eloquent the diary is on the subject of the animals’ passing, in contrast to the discussion of her mother’s recent death, which is much more muted and matter of fact.

The diary shows us just how deeply embedded the animals were in Jennie’s emotional life. Yet her decision to end their lives, and the substantial pain that this caused her, was certainly bound up in a wider change and grieving process for her mother – when she let go of the cats she also let go of the home life that they had lived together for so long.

Now, at nearly sixty, Jennie was on her own for the first time, and free to begin a new life.

Dr Jane Hamlett will be speaking about pets in the nineteenth and twentieth century in our free lunchtime talk on 29 March 1.15pm-1.45pm. A small exhibition of original documents, including Jennie Hill Gauntlett’s diaries, will be on display alongside some archive film before and after the talk. Find out more here.

Dr Jane Hamlett, Royal Holloway University of London