Looking at Eighteenth-Century Clothing 1

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Back of Gown. Striped silk taffeta with checked pattern created by extra warp float, bodice and sleeves lined with linen, skirt edges finished with pinking. England or Virginia, 1770-1780. Associated with the Blair Family of Virginia.1983-225.

The clothing that people wore in the past has the ability to fascinate and involve us as few objects of their material culture do. Clothing is intimate. Viewing a garment in a museum collection elicits an almost instinctive urge to touch it and try it on ourselves (actions that are, of course, not recommended for reasons of conservation). For some, it is a wish to experience the beautiful fabrics, elaborate decoration, and tactile qualities ;experiences no longer found in most of our own clothing. For others, it is a desire to understand people from the past a little better; if we know such details as how they dressed themselves in the morning, what it felt like to be laced into stays, or what it was like to wear coarse linen and woolen while working in a Virginia tobacco field, we might better understand the routine, human aspects of their daily lives, which are so seldom revealed in the written records they left.
The clothing illustrated in this article was worn by living people who had much in common with us. Not only did people then respond to fashion, they also varied their garments based on the activity and the formality of the occasion. The eighteenth-century words "dress" and "undress" had meanings quite different from the way we use the words today, though the basic concepts are still viable. "Dress" clothing meant formal clothing with a different set of conventions and accessories from "undress," or informal clothing. In 1775, for example, a woman could still don a pair of exaggerated side hoops, or "panniers," to support her wide skirt for a dress occasion, while her undress clothing ;although it would appear quite formal to our eyes;had a more modest skirt size that may not have needed hoops at all. Similarly, the clothes in which a wealthy planter conducted his daily business differed significantly from what he wore to a ball at the Governor's Palace. The garments worn by a blacksmith or dairymaid for daily work were different from their best outfits, reserved for Sundays at church and infrequent special occasions.

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Mrs. Thomas Newton,Jr. (Martha Tucker) by John Durand.Oil on Canvas. Virginia ca. 1770. Mrs. Newton of Norfolk, Virginia, wears a sack back gown with self-fabric trimming, sheer neck handkerchief, sleeve ruffles, and a small cap.Gift of M. Knoedler.,G1954-273

Textiles and clothing--ephemeral objects that are subject to moth, mildew, and the wear and tear of laundry, restyling, and recycling into quilts or rags; are nevertheless able to help us understand a great deal about history. Consider the fact that a planter's daughter in tidewater Virginia in the 1770s could have worn at the same time a gown of silk from China, underclothing of linen from Holland, and footwear made in England – all shipped in a vast network of trade from their places of origin to a shop or warehouse in London, where they were selected by a merchant, packed for a lengthy voyage across the ocean in a ship propelled by wind, to arrive finally in Virginia. Or that a slave – whose very freedom was entangled in a network of trade and commerce – could be wearing clothing made from inexpensive textiles imported especially for his use – a shirt of linen woven in northern Europe, woolen hose from Scotland, or a knitted cap from Monmouth, England. Clothing and accessories worn in eighteenth-century America were selected from sources all over the world.
Some upper-class Virginia men ordered suits custom-made to their measurements in London. They specified expensive fabrics like superfine woolen broadcloth or silks. Their suits were sometimes embellished with imported buttons and other expensive trimmings. Women could also purchase many of their items of apparel, especially petticoats, laces, shoes, stockings, cloaks, aprons, and even stays, ready-made through the import trade. Their gowns were more often made by local seamstresses or mantua makers. Some women made their own clothing, especially work garments and shifts. Only in frontier areas was most clothing homespun and homemade – and even there, traders and storekeepers quickly penetrated the backcountry to make imported goods available

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Woodcut.This detailed illustrated an advertisement for runaway slaves that appeared in the Virgnia Gazette (Purdie and Dixon) March 28, 1766

The clothing worn by eighteenth-century Virginians was characterized by great diversity, as one would expect in a society ranging from royal governors and wealthy landowners to indentured servants and slaves. Upper-class Virginians kept abreast of the latest English fashions through imported garments, letters from England, news from travelers, and immigrating dressmakers or tailors. Surviving garments, portraits, and written records indicate that when affluent Virginians had occasion to dress up, they were very elegant indeed.
As early as 1724, Hugh Jones wrote in The Present State of Virginia that Williamsburg's leading families dressed like the gentry in London. Thirty-five years later, the reverend Jonathan Boucher described Virginians: "Solomon in all his Glory was not array'd like one of These. I assure you, Mrs. James, the common Planter's Daughters here go every Day in finer Cloaths than I have seen content you for a Summer's Sunday. You thought (homely Creatures as you are) my Sattin Wastecoat was a fine best, Lord help You, I'm noth'g amongst the Lace and Lac'd fellows that are here. Nay, so much does their Taste run after dress that they tell me I may see in Virginia more brilliant Assemblies than I ever c'd in the North of Engl'd, and except Royal Ones P'rhaps in any Part of it."