The Diary of Mary Hardy 1773-1809 : 1. Public house and waterway 1773-1781

This is the story of a hardworking woman told in her own words.

The opening volume gives the full text of her years at Coltishall, on the Norfolk Broads near Norwich.

The diarist's husband William, a former excise officer, is a brewery manager and tenant of a small farm.

In 1776 he builds a sailing barge, a wherry, to carry his produce down to the port of Great Yarmouth. His wife, with three very young children, copes with all the problems that come their way.

She nurses the younger two through smallpox inoculation and works long hours at a nearby public house during an innkeeping interregnum.

The eccentric curate and some drink-prone and indebted innkeepers add to her load.

The set of four volumes is offered at a special price (ISBN 978-0-9573360-4-9), where you can read more about this lavishly illustrated and annotated edition of the diary.