BRITISH CONSERVATISM AND THE PRIMROSE LEAGUE ... - ideals

225
she was recruited successfully for the cermonial
post of Dame
President.59
p ar more active in Habitation affairs was W.J.
Fitzherbert Brockholes, a prominent landowner in the region.
The occuptional categories in which Garstang Habitation
appeared noticeably deficient include the armed services and clerical
sectors.
No individuals were associated with the former, while only
three (4.2 percent) were identified with the latter.
Their status as
single women and the absence of other family members suggests they
served as domestic servants for local vicars.
Professsionals accounted
for 3.1 percent of the named members while services constituted a
substantial 16.8 percent of those listed.
Shopkeepers made up 11
percent of those listed as compared with 12 percent for skilled
tradesmen.
The number of Knights and Dames recorded on the Garstang
register was 6.1 percent of the total, slightly more than the 5.9
percent listed for Melbury. Men were 58 percent of all individuals on
the register.
As for the women, 27 percent were married, 73 percent
single.
The preponderance of single women participating in the League
appears also to have been exhibited on a national level, based on the
large numbers of "Misses" appearing as officers in the 1888 and 1899
Rolls, although no figures have been provided in this chapter to
demonstrate this claim.
While their presence might suggest a
propensity for youth, it seems more probable that women of all ages
59 Minutes of the Garstang Habitation, 7 March 1895.