The seamstress and bandwoman

Who sewed up the linen items for wear and for the household; the shirt and smocks, neckwear and wristwear, sheets and pillowberes, tablecloths and napkins.  The answer is that while many items might be made in the home by a housewife, or in a household with servants by female servants, many were made by professional seamstresses and bandwomen. Until recently these women have tended to be overlooked, because they were not organized into guilds, and they rarely appear in records. [Figure 1]

Figure 1: Two women sewing by Geertruydt Roghman(1625-57). Met Museum

What did the seamstress do?

Randle Holme explains as follows: “The Seamster or Seamstry work follows next in order to that of a Taylor; this being work to adorn the Head and Hands and Feet, as the other is for the covering of the Body; nay, very often the Seamster occupieth the room and place of a Taylor in furnishing the Nobility and Gentry with such conveniencies as serve the whole body, especially in the Summer season.” He then has a long list of what seamsters do and make, this does include plain sewing; he lists hemming and seaming, and the cutting and shaping of the cloth, and the use of patterns, which he describes as “Paper cut in fashions according as the Work is to be made.” In terms of garments, he lists both shirts for men and smocks for women, and bands, ruffs, ruffles, cuffs, cravats, coifs and “Handkerchiefs for Womens Necks, both round and square.” For the house he lists the making of sheets, towels, napkins, table cloths, cupboard cloths, and pillow beres. The last item is pillowcases, the earliest use of the word pillowcase, according to the OED is 1633. Beyond these sewn items he also lists both bobbin lace, “Bone-Lace and Parchment-Lace Makers” and needle lace, “Point, a kind of Lace worked with a Needle.” This range of skills appears to be normal. (1 pp. 97-8)

Apprenticeships and arguments

Although there were no seamstresses’ guilds, women could be apprenticed to become seamstresses, and a few records of this survive. In a 1622 indenture, Katherine Farmby, a joiner’s wife, is to spend four years teaching Katherine Dickinson seamstry, it states that she will teach among other things, whitework and blackwork, all sorts of network, purse work, tent stitch, etc. Some apprentices complained that they were not learning what they should, one stated that she was spending her time making coarse shirts, rather than doing finer work.   They might also learn skills beyond those listed by Holme, in the 1660s Frances Carey was trained in “the art of a sempstress and to wash and starch linen”.  The making of patterns was part of the trade, and Hester Hudson, who was apprenticed in 1650, stated that she would set up on her own once “she were free [of her indenture] and had but some patterns.” (2 pp. 161-2) Between 1654 and 1670 several girls were apprenticed in London to Richard Hill and his wife, it would appear that the wife was the seamstress, and they charged one girl, Prudentia Cooper, £50 for her indenture. (3 p. 18) An arrangement where a wife works with a  husband maybe more common than we know, Giles Moore’s tailor Richard Harland, has his wife working with him. Jan Luyken’s 1694 print shows a tailor in the traditional position, with a woman sitting sewing in a chair next to him. [Figure 2]

Records in Household Accounts

In terms of basic sewing, the Shuttleworth accounts show both shirts and sheets being made for the household. In 1602 a piece of canvas of flax hurds containing 50 yards, was made into five pair of sheets and two shirts for the cow boy, Watmoughe, with some cloth remaining “in her [Elizabeth Russell’s] hands.” (4 p. 153) Russell was the Shuttleworth’s housekeeper, so it may have been that she passed the sewing of these items onto others. Canvas of flax hurds, sometimes referred to as harden, is a cloth made from the coarser parts of the flax plant. On another occasion someone external to the

Figure 2 Jan Luyken, Tailor in his Book of Trades, 1694. Rijksmuseum

household, the wife of Edmund Robinson, is paid “for makinge my Mr ii shirtes and thread vid” (4 p. 167)

In the 1620s the Howard of Naworth accounts show a woman called Jane Bell being paid to make a variety of items including “rayles, handkerchefs and ruffes for my lady.” (5 p. 235) She is paid 16d for making three smocks and 4d for making a ruff. (5 pp. 188-9)  Another woman, Marg Wilson, is paid 2d for making a lawn handkerchief. (5 p. 237) As Susan North has noted, neither of these women were household servants, though they may have been related to servants. (6 p. 180)

In the 1640s the Countess of Bath employed bandwomen. In 1641 this was a Miss Anthony; “for making 2 gorgets & tiffany to one of them” she was paid one pound. (7 p. 185) In 1648 there is, “the band woman Miss Watson for making 2 crabets 6d, for one plain handkerchief & cuffs 1s 6d, for one plain one 1s, for one laced hand & cuffs 10s 6d”. (7 p. 267) A crabet is a cravat as these had already started to appear, in a 30^th March 1643 letter Oliver Cromwell requested Cornet Squire to “Bring me two pair of boothose from the Fleming’s who lives in London Lane; also a new cravat.” (8 p. 221) The following year Miss Watson is paid again this time, “for a lawn suit and a fine Holland handkerchief and cuffs and mending other plain linen & making a band and cuffs £2” (7 p. 277) The reference to a suit is probably a set of matching linens, for example there is a set of linens in the Manchester collection which all have a cutwork design of a lattice alternating with stars, there are a pair of linen sleeves, a band, coif and forehead cloth. [Figure 3]

Figure 3 Sleeves and a matching band in the Manchester Collection

Further down the social scale Giles Moore, who was rector of Horsted Keynes in Sussex from 1656 to his death in 1679, frequently pays his tailor’s wife for the making of his shirts, bands, etc. Richard Harland, the tailor, is recorded making doublets, breeches, and cassocks for Moore, and his wife obviously has a girl to help her with the linen sewing as in 1662 Moore pays, “Rica. Harland's wyfe for making Mee 3 new shirts of home made cloath, supra 2d givn to her girle 1s 6d”.  (9 p. 26) The following year he pays her again, “Bought 3 ells more of 4s the ell [linen] to make a shirt withall with which I made a shirt & paid Goodwife Harland for making and marking it 8d.” (9 p. 47) Goodwife Harland also makes and marks caps and handkerchiefs for him. Marking indicates the embroidering of initials or other indicators of ownership on items. In 1656 Moore records napkins and sheets being marked with G.^M. S. (9 pp. 14-5) Some surviving garments from the period still have their embroidered markings. The smock owned by Elizabeth Palmer (1669-1720) has E.P. embroidered in cross stitch at front opening, and therefore predates her 1690 marriage. A completely plain, mid seventeenth century, linen kerchief in the Victoria and Albert Museum has the letter C embroidered in one corner, again in cross stitch. [Figure 4]

Figure 4 Embroidered C on a kerchief in the Victoria and Albert Museum.

Records in Royal Accounts

Unsurprisingly the Royal households had their own seamstresses. In 1603 James I inherited Dorothy Speccart, who was employed by Elizabeth I as a silkwoman, and she was still in post when Charles I came to the throne in 1625, when she is referred to as a seamstress. One 1625 bill, for work actually done for James but billed after his death, includes, “three dozen of fine holland shirts with falling bands and cuffs of fine Cambricke to them, two dozen of ruffs of fine Cambricke … six dosen of fine handkerchers stitched and edged with bone lace, one dosen of night cappes wrought with Cutworke and edged with needleworke purle…” While Dorothy and her husband Abraham, continued to work for the King he also appointed Julian Elliott as his seamstress. She had worked for him when he was Prince of Wales, and her bills for 1622-3 include, “for her pencone [pension, the word used to mean just a regular payment for services] for makinge the lynnen belongeing to his hig[hness’]s body for halfe a yeare att our ladey day 1623 £26.” After the Civil War Charles II appointed Dorothy Chiffinch as his seamstress, she was the wife of Thomas Chiffinch, Keeper of the Privy Closet and the King's Jewels. Like her predecessors she must have had a considerable number of people working for her. The first bill we have from her, in September 1661, records the making of 108 shirts, 54 half shirts, twelve dozen (144) pocket handkerchiefs, 18 night caps, 18 pillow beres, 12 pair of sheets, 3 pair of tennis sheets, 18 pair of stockings, three trunks to carry it all in and for the first washing of all his linen £120 9s 0d. By 1663 there was a second seamstress named in the wardrobe accounts, Sarah Border, she was making shirts and bands for the Children of the Chapel Royal. (3 pp. 16-27)

Seamstresses with Shops

It appears that, in London at least, seamstresses may have had shops. The play The Faire Maid of the Exchange, which was published in 1607 and was possibly written by Thomas Heywood, is to a large part set in the Royal Exchange. The Exchange was built in 1567 and contained about 120 shops, it was similar to the Palais Royale in Paris, and as you can see in Bosse’s 1636 engraving the shops were small, here on the left is a book shop, in the centre a shop selling fans and gloves, and on the right a shop selling linens, with rebatos, bands and cuffs on display. (10) [Figure 5] In the play when Gardiner goes to the Exchange to buy bands and other linen, Phillis (the Fair Maid) says to him: “My shop you mean, sir; there you may have choice of lawns, or cambricks, ruffs well wrought, shirts, Fine falling bands of the Italian cut-work. Ruffs for your hands, waistcoats wrought with silk, Nightcaps of gold, or such like wearing linen. Fit for the chapman of what-e'er degree.” (11) In the 1660s Samuel Pepys also purchased there from seamstresses, “To the Old Exchange and there of my new pretty seamstress bought four bands.” (12 p. 8 Apr 1665)

Figure 5 Bosse Gallerie du Palais, 1637. Rijksmuseum

Conclusion

In terms of the general education of women sewing was very important. While most girls would probably have learnt sewing from their mothers, and it was taught to those few girls who attended dame schools for use in the home, for some it could be a way of earning a living.  In the 1631 work Tom of all Trades, the author writes of the education of daughters, “Though she never have a dancing Schoole-Master, A French Tutor, …. It makes no matter. For working in curious Italian purles, or French borders, it is not worth the while. Let them learne plaine workes of all kind, so they take heed of too open seaming.” Later he says “she may learne what belongs to her improvement, for Sempstrie…” (13) 

References

1. Holme, Randle. The academy of armory. [Online] 1688. [Cited: March 31, 2022.] https://quod.lib.umich.edu/e/eebo/A44230.0001.001?rgn=main;view=fulltext.

2. Gowing, Laura. Ingenious Trade: women and work in Seventeenth-century London. Cambridge : C.U.P., 2022.

3. Wardle, Patricia. "Divers necessaries for his Majesty's use and service": seamstresses to the Stuart kings. Costume. 1977, Vol. 31.

4. Harland, John (ed.). The House and Farm Accounts of the Shuttleworths ...1582-1621, Part 1. Lancaster : Chetham Society, 1856.

5. Ornsby, G. ed. Selections from the Household Books of the Lord William Howard of Naworth Castle. Publications of the Surtees Society. 1878, Vol. 68.

6. North, Susan. Sweet and clean?: bodies and clothes in Early Modern England. Oxford : O.U.P., 2020.

7. Gray, Todd. Devon Household Accounts 1627-59. Part 2 . Exeter : Devon and Cornwall Record Society, new series, vol. 39, 1996.

8. Cromwell, Oliver. Thirty five unpublished letters of Cromwell. Littell's Living Age. 1848, p. 221.

9. Bird, Ruth, ed. The Journal of Giles Moore of Horsted Keynes, 1655-1679. Lewes : Sussex Record Society, 1971.

10. Saunders, Ann. The Royal Exchange. London : London Topographical Society, 1997.

11. Heywood, Thomas. The Fair Maid of the Exchange. London : The Shakespeare Society, 1846.

12. Pepys, Samuel. Diary. [Online] [Cited: May 24, 2024.] https://www.pepysdiary.com/diary.

13. Powell, Thomas. Tom of all trades. London : Benjamen Fisher, 1631.