Life in the early twentieth-century coalmining communities changed very little for the women who dedicated their lives to their miner husbands. The women's working days were much longer than the miners, who typically worked an 8-hour shift. Their living conditions were poor and lack of investment by the coal owners greatly challenged their homemaking skills as they faced life without many basics, such as clean water and sewerage systems. Health services were slow to develop and women's health was only just beginning to be of some importance to the medical profession. Coal-miner wives in the twentieth century also had to cope with demands put upon their families by the First World War, which highlighted the importance of solidarity, a feature of mining communities that had proved itself to be at the heart of colliery village life. This follow-up book to the popular Women of the Durham Coalfield in the 19th Century continues with the story of Hannah's daughter as she negotiates homemaking in the most challenging of conditions.

The success of the Durham Coalfield and its important role in the Industrial Revolution is attributed to men of influence who owned the land and the pits, and men who worked in the coal-mining industry during the Victorian period. There has been very little written about the importance of the home life that supported the miners - their wives who, through heroic efforts, did their best to provide attractive, healthy, happy home for their husbands, often in appalling social conditions. To provide a welcoming atmosphere at home demanded tremendous resources and commitment from the miners' wives. Despite their many hardships these women selflessly put everyone in the family before themselves. They operated on less rest, less food at times of necessity and under the huge physical burden of work and the emotional burden of worry concerning the safety of their family. Women of the Durham Coalfield in the 19th Century: Hannah's Story addresses the lack of information about the role of women in the Durham Coalfield, engagingly explored through one woman's experience.