A Privy, An Outhouse, A Necessary Room...

...Call it what you will, we all need them.  Preferably the modern, indoor, flush version.

Regular readers will know that one of my favourite walks takes me through a barley field and past this dinky cottage - follow the path, then look to the left, you can see the roof.

Set away to the side of the cottage is a small, brick, outbuilding.  A privy!  The very necessary, outhouse.

Of course these days the cottage has modern plumbing, but it is an old cottage and this outhouse is what passed for the conveniences.  Imagine trekking down there on a cold, dark, wet night... either that or use a chamber pot.

Those of a sensitive disposition should read no further!


It would have been dark inside there, even on a bright sunny day.  Note the sloping roof which lets the rain run down and off the building.  This one may have been a double seater - there are two holes at the back where the waste could either drain, or buckets could be removed.

with thanks to www.1900s.org.uk

There were a couple of methods of dealing with the waste products.  In the diagram above,  it was left to rot down in some sort of stinking 'compost heap'.  If the heap was too large, or the privy became blocked ''The Night Soil Men'  could be hired to come and dig it out - during the night - hence the name.  What a job.

An alternative method was to use buckets, which could be either emptied onto the compost heap periodically, or, The Night Soil Man would come around to do the emptying and carting, for a fee.

When we moved to the Byre there was a very large shrub and ivy covered clump at the back of the farmhouse.  When we finally broke through the ivy, it turned out to be the old privy, still complete with two buckets.  This is one of them.  Note the oval shape and the two sturdy handles.  You really wouldn't want any accidental slips when emptying one of these...

Unfortunately, when the ivy was cut back the building was found to be unsafe and had to be dismantled;  we didn't want to lose all of the history, so we retained the footprint and turned it into a herb garden.  We also kept the old privy buckets!  They were both perfectly clean and fresh, or I wouldn't have kept them!

Jonathan added some huge hunks of wood, left over from the renovations, to create a bench seat.

He mischievously  positioned these so that anyone who sits on the bench would be sitting 'back to back' with those who used the privy in times gone by.  Boys!