Coming up to the final stretch, so to speak, writing the next book – which is going to be about the darker side of textile history. At the moment, I have pieces coming out about the early writers of knitting manuals, which is slightly more cheerful territory. But I’m currently researching something much darker and so thought I’d share this snippet (image from a later period, but it gives you the gist).
Pre-Victorian, but full of the later nineteenth century belief that “the devil makes work for idle hands”, etc. Whilst men were used in chain gangs, stone-breaking or road improving, or oakum picking (recycling tarry rope fibres); women were put to the task of sewing endless linen shirts, knitting stockings, or spinning line (flax). Which shows you how soul-destroyingly boring they thought these tasks to be. And also, how “improving” or “character building”.
From “The Morning Post”, (London), Monday, August 11th, 1817;
The system adopted by MRS FRY and the association which she has formed for reclaiming and improving the condition of the female prisoners of Newgate, has been eminently succesful. Within a period of little more than three months the women and girls have made nearly 4000 shirts, &c. They have knitted 220 pairs of socks and stockings, and have lately commenced the spinning of flax. The amelioration in their morals has kept pace with their progress in the habits of industry…
Almost twenty years on, Dickens was to describe a visit to Newgate in ‘Sketches By Boz’ (1836). He mentioned a piece of ‘pasteboard’ (cardboard) with quotes from the scriptures, propped against a wall in the dining hall. Moral improvement seemed the aim.
He watched some of the women at lunch, noting that one or two of them immediately picked up and resumed “needlework” after eating. Dickens contrasted the women’s side of the prison where women seemed to be working, and purposeful – to the men’s where they “sauntered” around looking bored. So it seems Elizabeth Fry’s influence could still be felt twenty or more years on.
Check out The Knitter, Issue 129, for my latest piece on knitting history. There are some more bits of knitting history coming up in ‘The Knitter’ so stay tuned – and I’m currently working on a very exciting bit of research on a Very Famous Incident, for a U.S. magazine – details next year, when it’s out.
1862. Female convicts at work in Brixton prison. By Mayhew & Binny. [Public domain], via Wikimedia Commons
Gorgeous, probably British, pink waistcoat (not worm-eaten!) CREDIT: Metropolitan Museum of Art [CC0], via Wikimedia CommonsCurrently working on my new book – a sort of horrible histories for people who like textile history.
And I found this source, a book about the extant records of a York pawn shop. I haven’t yet been to see the primary source, but have been working on some very similar, previously unpublished sources, I uncovered in various archives.
18thC or 19thC printed linen, own collection. Many workaday clothes were made from this kind of fabric.
George Fettes was an Edinburgh man who ran a pawnshop in the late 1770s on Lady Peckett’s Yard in York.
Pawnbrokers’ records, like debtors’, are often a fascinating insight into the lives (and clothing) of ordinary folk. In ‘The Worm-Eaten Waistcoat’, (self published, York, 2003), Alison Backhouse gave a compelling glimpse into late eighteenth and early nineteenth century York and its denizens.
Pawnbrokers could sell any items that weren’t redeemed by the deadline. Although Fettes seems to have been a lenient man, often overlooking his own deadlines.
A glimpse into the Pledge Book 1777-8 shows that some customers were frequent flyers, like Mary Metcalfe of Walmgate who pledged gloves 25 times. She was probably a glove maker, pawning her own stock, to survive in business.
Occupations of pledgers varied and include: a joiner, dyer, a travelling woman, a chandler, a Trumpeter 11th regiment (York was full of soldiers; often garrisoned randomly in pubs in the city centre); , “the deaf woman”, – a “quack doctor”. Pledgers came from beyond the city walls, as well. Poor Betty Bridgewater travelled twenty miles from Kilburn with a counter pane, “very much worm eaten”.
Kind-hearted Mr Fettes seems to have even taken in “worm-eaten” textiles. Which tells us something about him, but also the fact that they maybe still had some intrinsic value; textiles being so hard to produce that the vast majority of the population were walking round in secondhand clothing.
A silver watch was pawned by the marvellously named Pendock Vame; an apprentice with Mr Firth of Coney St for 15 shillings on 18.7. 1777. The watch was redeemed but later sold because it was pawned again by John Turner of North St on 17th of November. Some of the clothing pawned was surprisingly personal. One common item of clothing often pawned were stays.
My stays, copies of c. 1790s-1800. Silk, lined with linen. Hand-sewn. Luceted handspun silk ties.
Here are just some glimpses of the clothes of eighteenth century York.
Hannah Priestley of Aldwark, on 14th July, 1777, accepted 11s 2d for 4 1/2 yds of new cloth, one new checked handkerchief, three pieces of new cloth, one checked apron, one cap and a pair of sleeves” (40)
On 2 Aug she was back with 12 s 1d worth of business:
one washing gown, one new tea kettle, one flannel petticoat, the yards of check, four yds if flannel also a Silk Petticoat Quilted.
Weirder items included:
A bird net
[pledged by Sarah Hill of Little Shambles, 21/11/77]
1 pair of black everlasting breeches,
[Pledge by Thomas Callis out of Micklegate Bar 13/11/78. “Everlasting” appears to have been a thick, maybe boiled woollen fabric, also used for sailors’ coats].
A glimpse inside a pair of stays. Wooden busk. I didn’t bother to match the lining – which is what you often see with 18thC clothing’s linings. Holes for ties all hand-sewn. These would be worth pawning in the 1790s.
For the knitters:
1 child’s gown and a pair of stockings 1 of them with the needles in it,
Pawned by Elizabeth Firth of North St in 1778 – they were pawned for a shilling and a penny, and they were unclaimed (43).
North Street was by the river and where many watermen and their families, of varying degrees of prosperity, would have lived. My favourite ancestor’s second marriage was at the church in North Street in the 1820s. All Saints has possibly the best medieval stained glass in York, even including the Minster – complete with zombies. Well worth a visit if you’re in the area.
According to Alison Backhouse: “Saturday was the busiest day of the week for receiving pledges” (45) Followed by Mondays. These were also the busiest days for redemption of pledges; suggesting York weekends were quite fun.
1542 of the pledges were for just one shilling (5p) – 14% of the total number of pledges. A quarter of items would never be redeemed.
I was very excited to contribute a picture of my new Jonathan Seidel loom to Laverne Waddington’s fantastic Backstrap Weaving blog, a few days ago. Picture can be found here:
Stoorstalka ‘Sunna’ heddle. For Sami weaving. This is a wide one! On Schacht inkle loom from Loch Ness Spindle Co. The warp is still being set up, here. Smaller slots are for pattern (red) threads. https://stoorstalka.com/
I’m currently learning inkle pick-up techniques, and have been switching between Susan J. Foulkes’ helpful info, and Laverne’s. Susan’s books are mainly on Sami weaving which has a slightly different structure to Laverne’s South American pick-up techniques. So I use different heddles – the beautiful horses one, below, is quite versatile, but I enjoy using the Sunna heddle(above) for Sami weaving.
I’ve been using the bands for all kinds of things; from a waistband tie for an 1800s’ linen petticoat, to straps for my bike bag, to impromptu hinges for the clothes horses. And just been enjoying the weaving.
Inkled hinges for clothes horse and waistband for linen petticoat (woollen band so I will replace with linen soon)
I always think it is aimless, fun weaving and then part way through, think of a pressing need for that particular band. Which is wonderful as it shows what a pragmatic thing this weaving is. You don’t need much equipment taking up loads of space. Between the Schacht and the Seidel looms I can do a great range of bands, and they seem to be permanently warped, with one thing or another, so are good value for money.
Saddle-bag straps
Have also booked onto this workshop on Japanese Sanada-Himo band, at the Oriental Museum in Durham, with Susan J. Foulkes, later in the year. Yet another rabbit-hole I’ve fallen down (an old one I’ve fallen down before) but aren’t those the best rabbit-holes? band weaving is a window into various cultures; both universal, and a product of specific worlds. I am enjoying broadening my horizons a bit as so much of my work has been focused on the UK, it is good to get an insight into the wider world’s textile arts, too. As Billy Bragg said: “What do they know of England, that only England knows?” When I get back to researching in reserve collections and looking at textiles; woven bands and ribands, will be a new thing I will keep an eye out for.
I started out inkle weaving because I couldn’t afford a ‘proper’ loom and ended up inkle weaving because I wanted to downsize and just get back to the basics of my craft (selling a wheel and a rigid heddle loom to finance this particular rabbit-hole). Like a continuous warp – it’s gone full circle.
Card loom by Jonathan Seidel. One of a handful in the UK. Using an old heddle I bought many years ago at a re-enactors’ fair. This is my first attempt at a pattern draft from Laverne Waddington’s ‘Complementary Warp Pick Up’ book.
Castlerigg stone circle, Cumbria. Where we went after Woolfest.
It’s the start of the season with freshy shorn fleece for sale, so I thought now is a good time to cover wool selection.
It’s been a few years since I went on about wool sorting. To my surprise, ‘Woolsort 101’ is still one of the most visited posts on this blog, so I decided to revisit it – today with the emphasis on wool selection. I won’t repeat myself re. wool sorting here, so refer to the old post if you’re new to this. Info on what you’re actually looking for – things like, checking for soundness, etc, are there.
Bassenthwaite Lake, where we had lunch after Woolfest.
Woolfest on Friday. I came back with three fleeces – all to scour, but one maybe to overdye. All three were grey. One, a very, very pale grey Shetland I bought from Adelaide Walker. I have had many Shetland fleeces over the years, but this is one of the nicest. I unrolled it yesterday and it turned out to be very well skirted and well rolled. Then a Ryeland/Shetland cross, from a sheep called Rosie, who belongs to Maureen Brittan in Stafforshire – thanks farmer, I always love to know the sheep’s name and so rarely do but of course, most of them are just Mrs Ewe,or Sheep 506, as farm stock they won’t often have names – we punters like it, though. And finally, a Ryeland from Vickie Haddock, near Penrith in Cumbria.
I wanted coloured short wools. Although there weren’t even close to the number of top quality fleeces at Woolfest, as you can find at Masham every year – I swooped in early Friday morning, to get the best possible. That’s another good tip. If you want raw wool, try and get to the first day of a two day show. Another pointer is, go with a firm idea of what you want/need to be prepared to be swayed if you see something unusual/fabulous. Ever since someone gave me some Wensleydale/Shetland cross, I have been on the hunt for what I call Weird Cross Fleece. If I see WCF and it is sound – I pounce.
Shetland fleece, still rolled.
Incidentally – that’s a point. An agricultural show where farmers are showing their very best stock, is a good place to get great fleeces. The show winning ones are, of course, premium but not always spoken for. I did, only once, manage to get a Best in Show fleece from Masham Sheep Fair(Cheviot).
We met some woolly pals at Woolfest, including the wonderful Ellie from the Doulton Flock of Border Leicesters. I’ll be posting later in the year when Ellie has the lambs sheared, as we hope to visit and pick out a fleece. I’ve never chosen one ‘on the hoof’ so it will be interesting to see if Ellie thinks I choose the best one! So, look out for that post. For now, here is Sam the Ram Lamb. His mum didn’t want to be in the shot.
Doulton Flock’s Sam.Shetland fleece, unrolled.
I am not a fan of longwools, usually – because I can’t comb wool, and don’t have the patience to learn when I can buy commercial tops. I love the way they look (lustre!) and spin, and I really love the way they dye; just don’t want to process them. But have recently fallen down the braid-weaving rabbit-hole, which I do around every few years, so want to spin something that will weave up nice braids. Incidentally, met the Braid Society at Woolfest and now intend to join. What a lovely, friendly group of people.
Which is the other point – these days it is easy to buy wool in person. There are wool shows popping up everywhere. (I remember when it was all fields round here). There are agricultural shows – and if you’re a spinner who has never got to one – a big recommend. The Rare Breeds Survival Trust sell fleece and of course, many local yarn stores now also carry fibre. Some traders act as sort of clearing houses to deal with nice fibre that would otherwise be unsold, and your humble mule, cross or meat sheep may also occasionally have a lovely fleece that shouldn’t be overlooked.
When I started spinning in 1984, all we had was the British Wool Marketing Board. You bought sight unseen from a narrow list of sheep breeds’ wool. I was extremely, unusually lucky almost every time. My first fleece was a Cheviot and, looking back, I now think it must have been great quality. I probably only ever had a slightly dodgy (as in kempy, and old looking wool) fleece once and that was a Jacobs, which is notoriously inconsistent, anyway. I still buy and love Cheviot today. Although Ryeland, which we couldn’t get easily then, is now probably my go-to shortwool, along with a local flock’s Norfolk Horn.
Here’s something shocking. In 1984, we’d pay around a fiver for a fleece. You can still get them for six quid or so, depending on the wool and who is selling. I still frequently pay even less than five pounds, if I buy a few at once.
Now I rarely buy sight unseen. I made that mistake a couple of months back as I needed some longwool for braid weaving and didn’t want to wait for Woolfest or the British Wool Show. So I bought from a farmer who ended up taking almost a month to send me the wool, only after I chased it up a couple of times by which time I might as well have waited for Woolfest. And, if I’m honest, comparing the wool I bought sight unseen to the fleeces at Woolfest from the same breed – Lincoln longwool – I wish I hadn’t bothered. Mine is flat, lumpen, not crimpy like the ones I saw and also got some straw which as VM goes in fleece, is one of the easier things to deal with – but at that price, I would rather not bother. I’m still on the lookout for some top end Lincoln longwool – as I’ve coveted it ever since we did a workshop/talk at the South Lincolnshire Guild, a few months back – on the way there, we fell in love with the landscape of South Lincs and I’d love some wool to remember it by!
Which brings me to the next point re. wool selection. Go to shows and even if you’re not buying; educate yourself. Use the opportunity of loads of fleeces in a small space, to learn about them, compare and contrast and just soak up all the info you can from simply looking and touching the fibre.
Vendor’s label on one of the fleeces I bought. Rosie’s fleece! Most of the wool we sell is very local to us so environmentally sound. But at a wool show, we can buy from further afield.
Take notes or better still, sneaky photos. Also, record what you buy so you can remember later. Sounds obvious but I have been doing this stuff for years and still fall down on that one.
Impromptu wool drying rack. Light enough to cart round the garden and move to sun spot. Sunlight kills some pathogens on wool. All our wool is dried in the sunlight.
Yesterday I washed the Shetland from Adelaide Walker. I use a secondhand little plastic twin tub, meant for caravans and run an extension cable out into the garden which means I only wool wash on sunny days. It’s adequate but I think I need something bigger and better, like a ‘proper’ old twin tub – soon! Then we made a new, impromptu fleece drying stand as fleece prefers to dry with its weight supported. Leftover chicken wire cable tied to an old shelving unit, did the trick. Not pretty but it works.
Last tip on wool selection… if someone is unrolling a fleece to inspect it – watch them. Or rather, look at the wool. At Masham, the other year, I had an interesting experience, as I was after a certain colour Shetland, and there weren’t many left by the time I got to the fleece sale tent.
A woman pipped me to a fleece I’d have liked. I watched her unroll it to inspect, lurking just in case she didn’t want it – which, as I watched her unroll it, I realised wasn’t likely as it was a stunning looking fleece. It looked fine; like lace curtains letting the light through when she held it up to the light – exactly what you’d want to see. And even from a few metres away, I could tell it was (if it had no breaks and wasn’t funky or something) a very, very nice fleece indeed. She unrolled it, inspected it, then pulled a face… and put it back. I had a quick check for soundness but could see it was one of the nicest Shetlands I’ve seen… Reader, I bought it. Not everyone knows what they’re doing – but you can.
Leo the Lion, a solstice visitor to Castlerigg stone circle. He has a shrine!
The Peterloo Massacre By Richard Carlile (1790–1843) [Public domain], via Wikimedia Commons. A blue banner saying ‘Liberty and Fraternity’ is still extant. See here: http://waterloo200.org/200-object/peterloo-banner/Anyone in the fibre arts world would have to have been living under a rock, in the past week, to have missed the delicious controversy, involving a certain orange buffoon, here:
Reading through the comments, one point made by the pattern’s detractors, really got my interest.
Knitting isn’t political.
Yes, right.
Textiles have always been interwoven with political life and dyed deeply with partisan lifeblood, like it or not. We can see our humble textile arts as a sort of retreat and escapism from daily life; or a way of engaging with those things that trouble, impact or interest us. We can also see it as both, at different times in our lives, as those things – escapism and engagement with reality – wax and wane.
But knitting isn’t political? Where to start?
Not just knitting, but all textiles are political. Revolutionary hats, tricoteurs, defying the stranglehold on economies and textile industries by the British Empire with a movement advocating homespun (America, India), the Rational Clothing movement that segued into suffrage for women, Garibaldi’s red shirts being dyed in the Yorkshire Dales, English Civil War and American Revolutionary Wars standards; in fact, banners and flags of any nation at any given time in history… Not political?
And then there was my own historical passion – the Luddites. At the height of the Peninsular War (and the Luddite rebellion), there were more soldiers posted to protect mills from attack here in Yorkshire, than there were soldiers stationed in the entire Peninsular, fighting the War. Textiles, on every level, whether mass produced or homemade, are always political.
Knitting has always been as intertwined with political life, as any other kind of textile.
Published in May 1812 by Messrs. Walker and Knight, Sweetings Alley, Royal Exchange. This cartoon may have been satirical. Luddites sometimes disguised themselves; although usually not in this way. Their ‘otherness’ to the establishment, made fairly clear, here. Via Wiki Commons.
The administration of Robert Watson’s estate (Shopkeeper. Selby, Yorkshire).
Sept 10, 1689
Inventory Nov 8th, 1688
Goods in the Shopp
5 doz of stockins att 7s, £1-15-; one doz ditto 13s; 3 doz of childrens stockins att 2s 6; 120 yards of blew linn, 8-17-8,…. 8 pr. of worstet stockings att 2s 6d., £1; 5 pr of womens stockins at 1s 8d., …. 21 lbs of worstet att 2s., £2-2; 4 1/2 of yarne at 18d per lb., 6s 9d…. 59 peices (sic) of small Incle att 8d., £1-19-4… 2 doz. of pinns, 9s…. 4lbs of knitting needles, 2 s; 3 paire of leather stockins, 1 s 6d…. 1 peice of callico,15s….a groze of Incle, 5s; 46 peices of ditto att 10d £1.0.4… A parcel if wash balls, 10s…Total of inventory £344.2.4
[This inventory listed all sorts other things… (three barrels of herring), oil, a huge inventory of spices, and tobacco].
INKLE Now rare. 1532 [First usage]. A kind of linen tape, or the thread or yarn from which it is made.
Over three hundred years on but only a few miles away from the now forgotten site of Mr Watson’s shop, I’ve been busy inkling, too. Something I have done on and off since the 1980s, although I only ever did simple threaded in patterns before and now am finally learning how to do pick-up patterns.
Almost every band I’ve woven recently has been pressed into immediate use – I’d forgotten how handy inkle bands are! I made one into a phone case, nalbinding the edges together; two others became ‘hinges’ for my two wooden clothes horses; another became a strap for a homemade duffel bag, and yet another, the waist tie for one of my 1800 period petticoats. Currently, I’m weaving edgings for a new viking outfit. When that’s done, I have a hatband to make. Then some little straps for my bike bag. Then, maybe a dog collar… It’s wonderful how useful this stuff is! I’d like to weave aimlessly, for the fun of it, but every time I start something I think of an immediate ‘urgent’ use for it!
I’ve been weaving bands to go round the neck, sleeves, and skirt of a viking dress I have been hand-sewing. My inkle loom does eight foot (ish) lengths and it has taken two lengths so far and will need part of a third. I will also be weaving for the neckband of a contemporary linen dress (Merchant & Mills’ Trapeze dress) as I have made two of this dress now and didn’t have fun with the facings, so am going to use handwoven inkle bands in place of bias binding on the neckline and armhole edges, to reinforce it without having to use a facing. I will need to weave this from some fairly fine linen or silk.
Bands for edging to viking dress. White handspun wool for background; millspun oddments for pattern.
So far I have used commercial cotton, commercial worsted wool as well as handspun, and commerical silk and linen thread. Like the nalbinding it is brilliant for using up odds and ends, and am finding some Mystery English Longwool handspun, from a couple of years back, to be a more than adequate warp. It helps that it is a longwool and spun in a worsted-ish way.
I learned pick-up (finally) by using one of the brilliant double slotted Sunna heddles from Stoorstalka in Sweden. But am also now using a double holed heddle from Vavkompaniet (also Swedish) and am slowly figuring out a couple of different types of pick-up.
I treated myself to a stunning curved Sámi shuttle, from Ampstrike on Etsy (Gunnar Kallo), which has the Uffington horse on it, to go with my horses heddle. I have a number of shuttles but find the curved Sámi style ones indispensible for pick-up. Although with the double holed heddle I also sometimes use a nalbinding needle to help with the pick up, if it’s a tricky row!
It is thought possible that the Anglo Saxons and Vikings may have used backstrap looms which have left no archaeological evidence – the Oseberg ship finds included a complete tablet loom, but some textiles were edged with what we’d now think of as inkle weaving. This could just as well be achieved with a backstrap set-up, and would be structurally identical bands to those woven on a modern inkle. So we will be playing with some viking crafts, including a bit of backstrap weaving, over the summer – message me here or email if you’d like to join us inkling in the viking houses! (Or indeed if you’d like to learn this one to one, or in a small group). We can teach you using a floor inkle, a Schacht, a backstrap set up or you can indeed bring your own loom, if you want to learn the basics!
For home use, and not living history, I went with a Schacht inkle loom from The Loch Ness Spindle Company. My old inkle loom was a generic one got in the 1980s from Fibrecrafts (now George Weil) – that no longer seems to be in production. It was never pretty. It vanished when I left it in a school stockroom, when teaching kids to inkle, a few years back. In the UK, the only real choice of inkles is between Ashfords and Schacht and I went with the latter, as I have a pair of Schacht hand-cards I’ve had for over 25 years, still going strong, which I love and also preferred the look of the Schacht. It has had one warp or another on it, virtually since the day I bought it, a couple of months back. If buying an older Ashford, be wary of the paddle system on the tensioner – now phased out but I know many people have had problems with them.
Years ago, I wrote a couple of articles on how to do simple inkling, for the lovely, late and lamented UK magazine for spinners, ‘The Spinsters’ Almanack’. If I can find those old articles, will scan them and put them up here as a resource for those who’d like to learn how to inkle. Although I now only really inkle using rigid heddles – to bypass the tedium of making string heddles. But your mileage will vary. Many folk prefer string heddles.
If you want to learn pick up techniques, I’d recommend trying a Sunna heddle. They are user-friendly, sturdy, and take some of the brain ache out of weaving your first few Baltic or similar style bands. But you will be limited by the number of pattern slots. Once you have your head round it, you can switch to string heddles, or a plain rigid heddle, or a heddle with a double row of holes which are slightly less user friendly for the beginner, but more versatile.
Still from Roundhay Garden Scene. Shot in Joseph and Sarah Whitley’s garden, at Roundhay Cottage, 14th October, 1888. IMAGE: Wiki Commons, Public Domain
On October 14th, 1888, Augustin Louis Le Prince shot the world’s oldest surviving piece of film – in a Leeds suburban garden.
Widely known as the “Roundhay Garden Scene”, the footage was shot by Louis Le Prince at the now demolished Roundhay Cottage, later known as Oakwood Grange, Roundhay in Leeds, and featured Le Prince’s son, Adolphe; a family friend, Annie Hartley; and Le Prince’s parents-in-law, Sarah Whitley (1816 – 1888) and Joseph Whitley (1817 – 1891). Le Prince had succeeded in developing a single lens camera and also figured out how to project images. There is every reason to believe he was the first person in the world to do this successfully. This caught my eye for several reasons. Not least, because like many of Leeds’ burgeoning middle classes in the nineteenth century; my family made the move from industrial Holbeck out to Roundhay. Later, my father was born close by Roundhay Park and one of my great grandfathers farmed on Lord Harewood’s estate at Roundhay. So when I see “Roundhay”, I always take an interest.
The compelling and weirdly haunting footage lasts only 2 1/2 seconds, showing the well-dressed, middle class family dancing on the lawn. Adolphe Le Prince, trying to establish a US patent for his father’s invention, was able to prove the film’s date as his grandmother, Sarah (the lady walking backwards), died ten days after the film was made. Imagine being the first person in the world to see moving images of your dead loved one, which the Whitleys and Le Princes almost certainly were. I wondered who Sarah Whitley was, and where she lived before she came to Roundhay. The answer, as I was to find out, was fascinating. To me, anyway.
By the time Adolphe Le Prince was doing this, his father was missing, presumed dead – vanishing somewhere between Dijon and Leeds, in September, 1890, only two years after the Roundhay Garden scene was shot. Louis was waved off on the Dijon-Paris train, by his brother and no-one was to see him alive, again. He’d been on his way back to Leeds where his invention and contents of his studio were packed up, ready to be dispatched to New York where the rest of the family waited and he had planned the world’s first public demonstration of his invention; moving pictures. Louis, and the luggage he had with him, which may have contained crucial information about his latest camera, vanished seemingly into thin air.
In recent years, a photo of a drowned man from Paris has come to light that some people believe could be Louis. We will never know. At the time of his disappearance, he was about to get a UK patent for his latest projector. As a strange codicil to the story, a few years after giving evidence about his father’s invention, Adolphe Le Prince was found dead in an alleged “shooting accident” in upstate New York. There were no witnesses – his body was found in woodland.
Even before I know the fate of two of the first ever film’s ‘stars’, and its cinematographer and inventor, I found the fleeting 2 seconds’ of footage somehow haunting and moving, without really knowing why. Part of me looks at this like any costume historian. (The Whitleys could come from the 1850s, rather than the 1880s! The two younger folk look, as you’d expect, much more fashionable for 1888). Part of me looks at this like …. well, you’ll see.
Louis Le Prince, ca. 1885, (I’d put this earlier) image from Armley Mills, Leeds Industrial Museum – see us there June 2nd at Leeds Wool Festival! IMAGE: [Public domain], via Wikimedia CommonsLouis was born in Metz, France, in 1841. His father was a friend of Daguerre, one of the founding fathers of still photography. Whilst studying in Leipzig, Louis met John Whitley who invited him to come to Leeds to work for his father, Joseph Whitley, brass founder. Louis duly moved to Leeds in 1866 and three years later, married Joseph’s daughter, Sarah Elizabeth Whitley (“Lizzie”). As we have seen elsewhere on the blog, Victorian Yorkshire industrialists were often very well travelled, and those working in technical fields, frequently went to Germany for the sort of advanced scientific and technical education British universities remained too hidebound to provide.
In 1930, a memorial plaque was placed on Woodhouse Lane – Louis had worked there in Joseph Whitley’s workshop. One of Joseph’s employees, James William Longley, was especially closely involved in the camera and projector’s development and the week the plaque was unveiled, Longley’s sister in law, “Mrs Rider”, told a reporter the camera “‘…looked like a knife-cleaning machine. Le Prince bought some black cloth for a cover, and I remember him giving my sister a sovereign for making the cover…'” [The Evening Telegraph and Post (Dundee, Scotland), Tuesday, July 1st, 1930].
During their time in Leeds, Louis and Lizzie set up a school for the applied Arts, on Park Square – their work included printing images (photos?) on various items. Coincidentally, my great grandfather was later to own a printing business on Park Square. I have no idea if it was the same building.
Thomas Edison’s employees started work on trying to create moving images around 1890 – two years after Louis Le Prince had shot footage in the Roundhay Gardens, and on Leeds Bridge. Before Louis disappeared, he had been well beyond his first iteration of his camera. But with Louis “missing” and yet not able to be certified dead by his family for seven years, Edison forged ahead and claimed to be the inventor of cinematography. Which was, in fact, the invention of a Frenchman, and largely carried out in a workshop in Leeds.
Reading a little about Le Prince, after I stumbled on the haunting Roundhay Gardens Scene, I saw a rather familiar address. It belonged to the elderly couple in the film; Joseph and Sarah Whitley.
Joseph was born in Wakefield and came to Leeds in 1844, to set up business as a brass founder. Like many of Leeds’ early industrialists, he lived for some time in Holbeck. An obituary described him as “‘the best brass founder in the world'” [Iron and Steel Obituaries, 1891]. No small claim.
On the 1851 Census, Joseph Whitley and family can be found at 1, Water Lane, Holbeck, in Croft Buildings, living with their two young children and a servant. Sarah, future artist and teacher, was then aged 5 – a few doors down, my great grandmother x 2, Mary Hannah Hepton, was two, and she had a number of siblings including an older sister, another Sarah, a year younger than Sarah Whitley. It’s unlikely the children, at least, didn’t know eachother.
Mary Hannah Hepton was to marry twice and her second husband was the nephew of a well known industrialist; the man who made his fortune from developing umbrella spokes and crinolines! Water Lane, Holbeck, seems to have been full of metalworkers.
A few doors down from the Whitleys, my great grandfather x 3, George Pool Hepton, lived then at 8 Water Lane. George was born in 1814 so a direct contemporary of Joseph Whitley, the older man in the film. In 1861, my great great great grandad was at 55 Water Lane on the junction with Saw Mill St, where my other great great great grandfather, William Stephenson, journeyman carpenter, from Westmorland, lived. The Whitleys were in Hunslet. By 1871, they were at Roundhay Cottage and in the same year, my Heptons were elsewhere on Water Lane, somewhere near Butcher St and finally, in 1881… at 1, Croft Buildings, Water Lane where George Pool Hepton was a Rent & Estate Agent along with his partner, and son in law, Joshua Strother. Thirty years on, and when the Roundhay Garden footage was shot, my family were still living in the very house where Joseph and Sarah Whitley, Louis Le Prince’s in-laws, had once lived and where Sarah Elizabeth Le Prince’s wife spent part of her childhood, until the Whitleys moved to Roundhay. At the time the Whitley’s lived in Croft Buildings, my family were just three doors down. Two of the people in the Roundhay Gardens film, were neighbours of my great grandparents x 3 and as contemporaries with children the same age – they must have known eachother.
After discovering this, I have found the footage even more haunting and cryptic. I don’t have a single photo of George Pool Hepton, or Hannah and they will always be unknowable to me. But there, dancing on a lawn, one long lost autumn in Leeds – their direct contemporaries and former neighbours – people who would have recognised them in the street. Somehow, you can imagine Joseph doffing his hat.
