The Cloak: ownership and a long decline.

Introduction

This is an examination of who owned cloaks and the long decline in their use in the seventeenth century. Many clothing historians have attributed this to Charles II’s declaration of a change of fashion in 1666. Pepys records this first on the 8^th October, “The King hath yesterday in Council declared his resolution of setting a fashion for clothes, which he will never alter. It will be a vest, I know not well how; but it is to teach the nobility thrift, and will do good.” Then on the 15^th October he wrote, “This day the King begins to put on his vest, and I did see several persons of the House of Lords and Commons too, great courtiers, who are in it; being a long cassocke close to the body, of black cloth, and pinked with white silke under it, and a coat over it, and the legs ruffled with black riband like a pigeon’s leg.” (1)

Figure 1: Robert Rich (1587-1658) by Cornelius Johnson. National Trust, Hardwick Hall.

 

Historians such David Kuchta have mainly examined the change from breeches, doublet, and cloak, to breeches, vest [waistcoat], and coat, from the perspective of fashions of the nobility and gentry. (2) There is a wealth of images of the gentry and aristocracy wearing their doublet and breeches with a cloak, but this article looks more at what cloaks were worn by the 90% of the population who formed the lower classes. (Figure 1)

Written sources and the decline in statistics

The decline in the use of the cloak over the course of the seventeenth century can be seen through cloak ownership from several sources. The Stuart Tailor database contains information on over 32,000 garments from the period 1603 to 1714 from a variety of sources.  The first source are garments appearing in probates and wills proved in Bishops’ Courts. Those people whose estates were extensive had their wills proved in the Prerogative Courts of Canterbury or of York, lesser people’s wills were proved in Bishops’ Courts. The Stuart Tailor database contains information from over 8,000 of these Bishops’ Courts wills and probates, 54% of these mention some form of clothing, often this was just covered by the phrase “all his/her apparel,” though sometimes the information was more detailed. Data has also been taken from, diaries and household, and wardrobe accounts, these are usually from the upper echelons of society. A third data source has been court cases, mainly from the Middlesex Sessions, where garments have been stolen. Between these three sources the database has over one thousand cloaks from the period are covered.

Around 10% of wills and probates mentioning apparel have a cloak, this is true for both men and women. There are over 520 cloaks from this source, and these show that 48% of cloaks were from the period 1603-25, 38% from 1626-50, and only 8% from 1651-1675 and 6% 1676-1714. The data from the household accounts and diaries has 350 cloaks, of which 82% are pre 1651 and a further 16% from 1651-1675.  These figures reinforce Gregory King’s 1688 “Annual consumption of apparel” analysis where he estimated that only 10,000 cloaks a year were being produced, compared with over a million coats. (3)

Ownership of cloaks

At the beginning of the seventeenth century a suit of apparel for a man was often a doublet and/or jerkin, breeches or hose, with a cloak. In the first half of the seventeenth century if a working person owned a cloak, then it was probably the most expensive garment he, or she, owned. The status inferred by having a cloak is seen in a quote from Rowland in 1612; “Because we walk in jerkins and in hose, without an upper garment, cloake or gown, we must be tapsters running up and down.” (4 p. 10) In the database the owners of cloaks range in estate value from £1 4s 0d to £843 19s 3d. Among the scant records from overseers of the poor, and parish provision to the poorest, there is little evidence of cloaks being provided, though some alms houses may have done so. (5 pp. 44-60)  Men own 70% of the cloaks in the database and women 30%. In terms of occupation there are 250 who give an occupation or status.

Unsurprisingly for women it is usually a status that is given, with over 80% described as widows. There are a few women described as singlewomen, spinsters and in one case a wife. The estates of the women vary as much as for the men. One widow among the poorest is also an almswoman, she may have received her cloak as part of the livery of her alms house. (6 p. 231) Even the richest woman has an estate value only half that of the richest man, she is described as a singlewoman, and owns two cloaks, one serge the other silk. (7 p. 54) It is interesting that there are few depictions of women wearing cloaks. Hollar’s engravings have a couple of women wearing a rectangle of cloth around their shoulders, like a shawl, but the only specifically cloak like garment is on his depiction of a Scots woman. (Figure 2)

Figure 2: A Scotch Woman by Wenceslaus Hollar. 1644.

 

For men there are 50 occupations listed across 175 wills and probates. What people referred to themselves as, is not necessarily what they were. In a will a man may say he is a gentleman, but those listing for probate may refer to him as a tanner, or a clothier, or some other trade where he earnt his money. An analysis shows that 22% considered themselves yeomen, and another 10% were also in agriculture as husbandmen, shepherds, labourers, etc. Some 22% considered themselves gentlemen, esquires, etc., and then there are those in the professions: clerics, physicians, schoolmasters, etc, who account for another 7%.  There is an abundance of different tradesmen, particularly: carpenters, shoemakers, tailors, weavers, etc.

In 1616 Thomas Ablestone, a vintner, whose estate was worth £15 18s 9d had two set of clothes. There was “1 cloke, 1 pear of hosse, 1 dublet, 1 jerkyn £1 6s 8d” and the second set of clothes comprised, “1 pear breeches, 1 dublet, 1 jerkyn 12s.” So, the cloak was probably worth at least 14s. (8 p. 258) Another man, for whom we seem to have a complete wardrobe, is  yeoman William Upton, who in 1614 had as “His wearing apparel: Item one jerkin, one doublet, one pair of hose, two pairs of stockings and one cloak, two shirts, four bands and one hat and two pairs of shoes £1 10s” (9) In 1615 Henry Piper, a poldavis weaver (poldavis was a coarse linen often used as sailcloth), left “his wearinge apparrell with a peece of course cloth to make a cloak.” (10 p. 82) Sometimes old cloaks are listed in probates, 1616 a shepherd, worth only £8 18s 7d, left “2 old cloakes 4s 6d” (8 p. 252)

In the 1620s and 1630s there are several records of husbandmen and lesser tradesmen leaving suits with a cloak in their wills, or listed in their probates. In 1625 George Robbins, a shoemaker, left his “best suit of apparel [and] best cloak, to Samuell Robbins.” (11 pp. 40-1) In 1631 Thomas Hyrons,  a carpenter, who was worth in his probate £10 12s 6d, of which £3 16s 10d was his clothes, owned two outfits “on[e] cloke and suit of aparrell £1 3s 4d” and “the other cloke and shute of aparrel  £1” (11 p. 98)                                               

When it comes to the Civil War period the difficulty is that the arrangements for proving wills went into abeyance. The offices of bishops and archbishops were abolished in 1646, and those of deans, chapters, etc in 1649. This means a gap in most probate records between at least 1650 and 1660, and often earlier. As a result of this, of the almost 23,000 garments listed in section of the Stuart Tailor database covering Bishops Courts and similar, only 1,500 are from the period 1642 to 1659 and only eighteen of these are cloaks. Seven of those cloaks are in one 1643 probate inventory belonging to a gentleman, Francis Johnson. (12 p. 132) Other owners include a mercer and a fellmonger, that is someone who deals is skins or hide, while four belong to a window, Elizabeth Burges who, in 1642 owns four cloaks, one for a women and “iij ould cloakes for a man.” (12 p. 125)

Cloaks are still around in the 1660s, but not as common. An exception are mourning cloaks, which were still in use but declining rapidly. In 1662 Elizabeth Radcliffe’s will states that her grandson, brother and two executors should be provided with mourning cloaks. By the end of the Stuart period mourning cloaks were still being provided but less often, Dudley Ryder reported of a 1715 family funeral that the principal mourners were provided with “cloaks, hatbands and black shammy gloves.” (13 p. 6th September 1715)

Figure 3: A non-conformist minister, 1688, by Marcellus Laroon.

 

For men by the 1670s they seem to be limited to clerics and those attached to churches, for example in 1671 Gregory Thornedale, who was a gentleman of the Chapel Royal, owned  “one haire camlet cloak, [and] one worsted camlet cloak with gold buttons” (14 p. 96) The rector of Horsted Keynes, Giles Moore, in his account book, records both the making and mending of his cloaks throughout the 1670s. (15) In 1684 William Bell, a clerk, leaves “all my wearing apparel as gowns, cassocks, cloaks and others,” he had been vicar of Huyton from 1642 to 1662 but had then resigned because of his nonconformity. (16 p. 113)  This marginalisation of cloaks is supported by Laroon’s 1688 Cries of London, it has depictions of 80 people, just six of the men have cloaks. There are two non-conformists, a minister (Figure 3) and a quaker, a man who is in Bedlam, a mountebank and “the Spanish Don,” who was from a commedia dell’arte troupe, the final wearer is the man crying “old cloaks, suits or coats.” (17) Where men in the 1670s leave cloaks and are not clerics, the cloaks are usually described as old. In 1675 John Keene, an anchor-smith, left “One old cloke 15s,” (7 p. 71)      

References                                                     

1. Pepys, Samuel. Diary. [Online] https://www.pepysdiary.com/diary.

2. Kuchta, David. The Three-Piece Suit and Modern Masculinity: England, 1550-1850 . Berkeley : University of California Press, 2002.

3. Harte, N. B. The Economics of Clothing in the Late Seventeenth Century. Textile History. 1991, Vol. 22.

4. Rowland, Samuel. The Knave of Harts. London : Printed by T.S. and are to be solde by George Loftus, 1612.

5. Spufford, Margaret and Mee, Susan. The Clothing of the Common Sort 1570-1700. Oxford : OUP, 2017.

6. Cunnington, Phillis and Lucas, Catherine. Charity Costumes of Children, Scholars, Almsfolk, Pensioners. London : Black, 1978.

7. George, E. and George, S. Bristol probate inventories, Part 2: 1657-1689. Bristol : Bristol Records Society publication 57, 2005.

8. Brinkworth E.R.C. and Gibson, J.S.W. eds. Banbury wills and inventories. Pt.1, 1591-1620. Banbury Historical Society. 1985, Vol. 13.

9. Hampshire County Record Office. Will of William Upton 1614. Hants. RO 1614B/81.

10. Reed, Michael, ed. The Ipswich probate inventories 1583-1631. Suffolk Records Society. 1981, Vol. 22.

11. Brinkworth E.R.C. and Gibson, J.S.W. eds. Banbury wills and inventories. Pt.2, 1621-1650. Banbury Historical Society. 1976, Vol. 14.

12. George, E. and S. eds. Bristol probate inventories, Part 1: 1542-1650. Bristol Records Society publication. 2002, Vol. 54.

13. Ryder, Dudley. The Diary of Dudley Ryder 1715-1716, edited by William Matthews. London : Taylor & Francis, 2024.

14. Reed, M. Buckinghamshire probate inventories 1661-1714. Buckinghamshire Record Society. 1988, Vol. 24, 258-9.

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

16. Earwaker, J.P. Lancashire and Cheshire wills and inventories 1572-1696. Manchester : Chetham Society, 1893.

17. Shesgreen, Sean. The Criers and Hawkers of London, engravings and drawings by Marcellus Laroon. Aldershot : Scholar Press, 1990.