The Mayflower and Her Log; July 15, 1620-May 6, 1621 — Volume 5Ames, Azel
History
The Mayflower and Her Log; July 15, 1620-May 6, 1621 — Volume 5
Ames, Azel
Massachusetts -- History -- New Plymouth, 1620-1691; Mayflower (Ship); Pilgrims (New Plymouth Colony)
very few among the Plymouth settlers), rather than the scholar,
publisher, tradesman, physician, hatter, smith, carpenter, "lay reader,"
and soldier of the Pilgrims, and would certainly have been obnoxious to
their finer sense of personal dignity and proportion. Doubtless an
equivalent provision existed--though in less "all-of-a-pattern "
character--in the bales and boxes of the MAY-FLOWER'S cargo for every
need suggested by the list of the Higginson "outfit," which is given
herewith, both as matter of interest and as affording an excellent idea
of the accepted style and needs in dress of a New England settler (at
least of the men) of 1620-30. One cannot fail to wonder at the
noticeably infrequent mention of provision in apparel, etc., for the
women and children. The inventory of the "Apparell for 100 men" furnished
by Higginson's company in 1628-29 gives us, among others, the following
items of clothing for each emigrant:--
4 "peares of shoes."
4 "peares of stockings."
1 "peare Norwich gaiters."
4 "shirts."
2 "suits dublet and hose of leather lyn'd with oyld skyn leather, ye hose
& dublett with hooks & eyes."
1 "sute of Norden dussens or hampshire kersies lynd the hose with skins,
dublets with lynen of gilford or gedlyman kerseys."
4 bands.
2 handkerchiefs.
1 "wastecoat of greene cotton bound about with red tape."
1 leather girdle.
1 "Monmouth cap."
1 "black hatt lyned in the brows with lether."
5 "Red knitt capps milf'd about 5d apiece."
2 "peares of gloves."
1 "Mandiliion lynd with cotton" [mantle or greatcoat].
1 "peare of breeches and waistcoat."
1 "leather sute of Dublett & breeches of oyled leather."
1 "peare of leather breeches and drawers to weare with both there other
sutes."
In 1628 Josselyn put the average cost of clothing to emigrants to New
England at L4 each. In 1629 good shoes cost the "Bay" colonists 2s/7d
per pair. In his "Two Voyages to New England "previously referred to,
Josselyn gives an estimate (made about 1628) of the "outfit" in clothing
needed by a New England settler of his time. He names as "Apparel for
one man--and after this rate for more:--"
One Hatt
One Monmouth Cap
Three falling bands
Three Shirts
One Wastcoat
One Suite of Frize (Frieze)
One Suite of Cloth
One Suite of Canvas
Three Pairs of Irish Stockings
Four Pairs of Shoes
One Pair of Canvas Sheets
Seven ells of coarse canvas, to make a bed at sea for two men,
to be filled with straw
One Coarse Rug at Sea
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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