Shopping Saturday - Henry White & Sons, tailors and habit makers

I bought a new book yesterday (just for a change! It was a bargain, honestly) 'The design and printing of Ephemera in Britain and America 1720-1920' by Graham Hudson, London 2008. It is full of wondeful illustrations, including decorative billheads for shops and other businesses. I have always been fascinated by these, and I have acquired a number of them. This one is an interesting example from my collection.

The business of Henry White and Sons, Tailors and Habit Makers, Regimentals, Uniforms &C is listed in London directories from 1837 to 1913, first at 53 Great Marlborough Street, Westminster, then at number 58. Henry White and his family lived on the premises to start with, and 53 Great Marlborough Street is the address given on his will, proved 6 May 1873; he died there on 1 April 1873. The business passed to his sons, Henry Hart White and Thomas Thrush White, and by the time of the 1891 census they had moved to Wandsworth and Islington respectively. Henry Hart White died 28 October 1896 at his home in Granard Road, Wandsworth, and Thomas was his executor. Thomas Thrush White died in 1933, aged 84.

The bill itself is interesting, partly because it is a nice decorative example, but also for what it says. It details the kind of work undertaken by Henry White and Sons 'Liveries, hunting clothes, ladies jackets, clerical clothes', but the really interesting bit is the phrase '5 Per Cent charged after twelve months Credit'. It was common practice at the time for customers to purchase goods on credit, and tradesmen often had difficulty collecting the sums due; it was a matter of honour to pay one's gambling debts, but tailors' and other tradesmen's bills were another matter. Legal action was theoretically possible, but was likely to result in the loss of any further business not only from that customer, but from their friends and acquaintances. So shopkeepers often preferred to suffer in silence, in the hope of eventual payment.

Finally, the details of the transaction itself are a goldmine for the costume historian, although the finer points of Victorian tailoring are lost on me, I'm afraid.

Follow Friday - HISTPOP

HISTPOP is one of my favourite sites, and at first glance seems to have to great appeal to genealogists; the home page even states ‘Note to genealogists and others tracing individuals: This site only contains a very small number of reproductions of original census enumerators' books for illustrative purposes.’ This is true, but of course a good genealogist is interested in more than just lists of names.

The site is provides background information on population statistics, through the work of the General Register Office. It includes the Annual Reports of the Registrar General for England and Wales, and the Census Reports up to 1931. There are scanned examples of documents held in The National Archives on census preparation, for example, and there is quite a lot of material for Scotland and Ireland too.

If you click on the 'Browse' tab there are several sections to choose from that explain what you can get from the site. The original source material is great, but I'd recommend that you look at the essays, written by Edward Higgs and Matthew who really know their stuff.

Or you can use the Search function to explore the site; try putting in the name of a disease or an unusual occupation and see how often it appears. Have fun

Advent Calendar - Holiday Foods

The first jobs I ever did were Saturday jobs while I was at school, first in a greengrocer's shop and then in a bakery. In the course of these two jobs I learnt something significant about Christmas food shopping; no matter how early you open the shop on Christmas Eve there will always be people waiting outside for you to unlock the doors; and no matter how late you close, someone will always come along and try the door after you have locked up.

But as for the food itself, I don't really have any particular memories of childhood Christmas meals - we lived in Scotland until I was 7, where New Year was the bigger holiday. My food memories are much more recent, from the time when I was in charge of cooking Christmas dinner, sometimes for a dozen people or more. Everyone lends a hand, and if you're really smart you can delegate everrything, end up doing nothing at all yourself and taking all the credit. Christmas dinner was always the usual turkey, stuffing, roast potatoes, vegetables, gravy and cranberry sauce, followed by Christmas pudding (with sixpences of course, except that since we went decimal they have to be 5p pieces). And regardless of how much they had put away at lunchtime, everyone could find room later on for cheese, sausage rolls, fruit, chocolates and so on, but most especially my mother's mince pies. I always made Boxing Day dinner an antidote to the richness of Christmas dinner; poached salmon, boiled potatoes and salad, followed by ice cream.

My mother still makes her famous mince pies, in industrial quantities, owing to popular demand. Everyone in the family has their own supply to take home, and I always have a large box that I take into the office after Christmas. Certain people that I work with wait eagerly for them every year, and I can't put them all out at once, I have to operate a phased release policy to ensure fair shares.

Warlike Wednesday: the War of 1812 - from the other side

I was lucky enough to be present when the Federation of Genealogical Societies Preserve the Pensions appeal was launched. These records are held at the National Archives in Washington DC, but there are two sides to any argument, and it set me thinking about any records from the British side that might be held in The National Archives in the UK.

Not surprisingly, there is quite a lot of material, and some of the records are full of the names of prisoners. Many prisoners were held on ships, and some of the most interesting records are the surgeons' journals kept by the Admiralty. They not only contain names, but give quite a lot more information besides. One of these is the surgeon's journal for the prison ship 'Bahama' carrying American and Danish prisoners.

The National Archives reference ADM 89/1

One of the volumes contains details of the illnesses and treatment of a number of men who were attended by the surgeon while the ship was at Chatham between 1812 and 1814. Some of the patients were sailors or marines, but most were prisoners. Some pages are just lists of names, but for a number of men ages are given, along with details of their illnesses, treatment, and whether they survived. Most of them did - there were only three deaths on board - but several of them, probably the sicker ones, were transferred to the hospital ship 'Trusty'.

The American prisoners whose ages and details appear were:

Alfred Leonard 39, Abnes Polland 41, Procter Symmonds 19, George Symington 48, George Brown 36, Adimus Bowen 44, Jeremiah Hill 46, Mr Lane (Mate) 48, Henry Shaw 32, Golding Spencer 30, Henry Scott 29, Capt Light 54, Francis Williams 28, Charlemagne 28

Medical details, but no ages, are given for:

James Head, Nicholas Noble, James Odihorne, Artimus Bowen, Jonathan Freeman.

All of these men either recovered or were transferred to the Trusty, except for Golding Spencer and Jonathan Freeman. Golding Spencer died of smallpox, and the unfortunate Jonathan Freeman died as the result of 'a singular kind of tumor in the groin' which was mis-diagnosed as a hernia by the first two surgeons who saw him. The third, James Brenan, took a great interest in this case, and wrote it up at great length. The abcess burst, and his symptoms were described in graphic detail. He succumbed to a fever as a result, was sent to the Trusty, but returned to the Bahama, apparently recovered, only to suffer a relapse that caused him to be sent back to the Trusty again, where he died.

Advent Calendar - the Christmas tree

I have an artificial tree now, but for some of my childhood Christmases we had a real tree. No matter how thorough the vacuuming, a small child will be able to find jagged little dried-up bits of pine needle for months afterwards - ah, those were the days!

But my overriding Christmas tree memory was not picking the needles out of my chubby little knees, or from the palms of my hands; it was the lights.

Modern lights are a joy, but the kind we had in the 50s and 60s were evil. They were put away carefully every year, but left unsupervised for 11 months they had plenty of time to get themselves into a tangle that would rival the Gordian Knot. That wasn't the worst of it, though; all the lights had to be in working order and properly connected to complete the circuit, otherwise none of them would work. It was a case of  'one out, all out', and every year there was always at least one faulty bulb or loose connection.

My father was a wonderfully laid-back, even-tempered, tolerant man. Except once a year when he was sorting out the Christmas tree lights. I think my mother used to grab the coats and take me out shopping until it was safe to go back! Once the lights were up and working, it was fun all the way, but Dad's annual grump had to be got out of the way first, a bit like having to eat up all your greens before you were allowed pudding, I suppose. Happy tree-lighting!