relevant to my interests

At which I was able to make a couple of minor contributions.

Reason why serving soldiers a very small statistical minority in divorce statistics pre-1914 (post then increased massively....): there were huge restrictions on how many could marry 'on the strength' so there were fairly few actually married in the first place. Mi knowinz on this partly from Victorian fiction (I think it features in one of Charlotte Yonge's) but mostly from Being A Historian who had to do with the Contagious Diseases Acts.

Also able to make some comments apropos of preserving archives of relevant organisations and the problems of digital records.

A lot of oh dear less change than one would like to imagine took place over time in matters of divorce, family disruption, domestic abuse, gendered assumptions, etc etc: but also, a sense that, in fact Back in The Past when women may not have had much agency, they were nevertheless using what they could get, e.g. separation law, protection orders, and various legal intricacies.

Also wondered how far they were able to manipulate (or the law was actually based on) certain patriarchal assumptions, which is what I found when reviewing book by one of the major contributors - i.e. that deserting husbands were falling down on doing patriarchy like they should, bad boy, no more right of coverture if your wife goes through a fairly cheap and simple legal procedure, post-1857.

Also there was a lot of archive love going on!

I mentioned that I was reading Dream Count for an intended new in-person book group of fairly local people connected through being (mostly) women historians (most of) whom I already know.

The gathering to discuss Dream Count was yestere'en in Highgate, at a destination to which there is a bus service from the nearby main road, though on Sunday evenings the service is a little more sporadic than habitual and I arrived a bit early, even after some difficulty finding the house in question. (Serious FAIL by local residents to actually have house numbers visible, ahem, not helped by several houses actually being nos XX-YY which adds to the confusion and in fact I ended up going to the wrong house first.)

However, once I got there it was agreeable to see auld acquaintance and talk of how things had been going -

- I am not entirely persuaded that having a sit-down at a table supper was actually a great idea, or maybe that was just me who had not all that long ago had a large late lunch.

Discussion of actual book did not get started for some while. Everybody seemed to have a rather mixed response, though it did, at least, provide a basis for discussion along several directions.

Future plans to meet at 6 week intervals - not to have full dinner party (relief!)* - next book will be Anna Funder's Wifedom about Eileen Orwell (already have the ebook yay).

Kind lift not all the way home but to useful point with lots of buses from Our Hostess.

*Snacks instead - should I take foccacia and Famous Aubergine Dip? Y/N

This week's bread: a loaf of Marriages's Moulsham Strong Malted Seeded Bread Flour, v nice.

Friday night supper: the sorta-nasi goreng with Calabrian salami.

Saturday breakfast rolls: eclectic vanilla, turned out quite well, but even though I upped the amount of vanilla extract, not very vanilla-y.

Today's lunch: sweet potato gratin thing, with some quite decent tapenade, served with Dharamjit Singh's spinach.