Launderer
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Le Lavandier / La Lavandière | The Launderer / The Laundress
The lavandier (male) and lavandière (female), or launderer and laundress, were the persons in charge of washing linen for hotels, inns, restaurants or individuals. From spring until fall, this work was usually done by a stream or river, as the water there was normally cleaner than that coming from a well. It was also an opportunity to socialize and gossip with the neighbours.
"The Laundress", painting attributed to Marie Marc Antoine Bilcoq, Wikipedia Commons
The first step in the washing process was to boil the linens or clothing in a large cauldron, suspended by a tree branch or an iron hook. At the water’s edge was a series of planks on which sheets and cloth were then beaten in order to remove dirt. Then everything would be rinsed, wrung, and laid carefully over grass, shrubs or fences to dry.
There were no wash-rooms (the equivalent of today’s laundromat) in New France’s towns, except for one ran by Marguerite Bourgeoys in Montréal. There, laundry was done for both the community and the church. Most launderers and laundresses who washed laundry for others picked up their loads in a wheelbarrow, did the washing by the water or in their own homes, and returned everything a few days later. Clothing and sheets could be hung outside on clothes lines, or inside (in the winter or rainy days) near a fire, on hooks or ropes hanging from ceilings. Generally speaking, laundry was considered women’s work, although men did pick up and drop off the laundry.
Eventually, a type of laundry soap made its appearance, made by boiling wood ashes. Then, laundresses used potash soap, as well as a washboard. To wring the clothes dry, some had a wringer consisting of two rolls through which clothing was passed to remove water.
A launderer was also called a washerman, and a laundress a washerwoman. In French, the lavandier was also called a blanchisseur, and the lavandière a blanchisseuse. The verb blanchir means to whiten.
"Laundresses in the Mosel below Metz" (1876 drawing or engraving (artist unknown), Wikimedia Commons)
The laundress ("La Blanchisseuse", 1761 oil painting by Jean-Baptiste Greuze, Wikimedia Commons)
Source: Jeanne Pomerleau, Métiers ambulants d'autrefois (Montréal, Québec: Guérin, 1990), 303-309.