This wide-ranging and impressive study of the girls brought up in Victorian parsonages draws on sources ranging from the published memoirs of famous Anglican families to obscure diaries which have survived by chance. Many of the latter may not have been studied or quoted before and provide the author with unique and fruitful material. In all, 109 families, most with several daughters, have been surveyed. Yamaguchi analyses the ways in which their father's occupation impacted on the lives of the daughters, with chapters on upbringing, parish work, marriage and personal faith. Education forms an important theme, since even though their schooling was little better than average for girls of their class, the daughters of the parsonage lived surrounded by books and many excelled at self-education. Some were among the first to study at university level in England, and many became teachers themselves, in both Sunday and day schools. The ‘family enterprise’ extended inevitably to philanthropy, with some daughters developing an almost morbid desire to help the poor. (Clara Bramston nursed cottagers with typhoid in secret, knowing that her parents would forbid this dangerous task.) When they married, many (including Clara) simply moved to another parsonage – of the 107 clergy daughter marriages analysed for this book, half were to clergymen. The author concludes that ‘their father's occupation shaped their daughters’ lives and constructed women's identity in the days when women had few qualifications of their own’. Some confessed to an attraction to the role of ‘vicaress’ – the nearest that they could come to ordination at that time.

This study reveals links to women's educational reform, the growth of Victorian charity, the expansion of women's occupations and the growth of feminism. The author is a professor at Daito Bunka University, Japan, who has been mentored by both Catherine Hall and Leonore Davidoff. This work bears the hallmarks of their own scrupulous studies of family, religion and gender.