Lately, I’ve been in the role of caregiver and nurse, and honestly, I’m not very good at it. I wouldn’t recommend getting sick at my house. I assure you that I would only do about a tenth of the caregiving things that Lydia Maria Child recommends in her 1837 book The Family Nurse; Or, Companion of the Frugal Housewife.
Child has a fascinating history as a poet, author, journalist, and domestic manual writer. She was a fervent abolitionist and activist for Native American and Women’s Rights. And there’s a tie-in with the US holiday Thanksgiving happening this week. Child wrote the Thanksgiving song “Over The River and Through The Woods.”
Hints For The Preservation Of Health
NEVER meddle with medicines, unless some disorder of the system renders them really necessary.
Take meals at regular hours. Do not eat a variety of things at the same meal; nor indulge merely for the pleasure of it, when the wants of nature are satisfied. Avoid rich and stimulating articles of food and drink.
To preserve the digestive organs in good order, may almost be called the one thing needful, as it regards bodily health. Observe the effects of particular articles on your system, and indulge or refrain accordingly. If not as well as usual, eat nothing. Fasting and cold water are the best physicians, nineteen times out of twenty.
Many think distilled liquors are necessary for those who work in cold, damp places; but in fact they only increase the danger of taking cold. Their effects are evil continually.
Sleep in rooms with a free circulation of air. Have no fire burning, or fragrant flowers in the room.
Do not cover your face with the bedclothes. Have clean bed-linen once a week. Do not have a current of air blowing directly on your bed.
Feather beds are debilitating, except in very cold weather.
The convalescent woman by Vincenzo Cabianca
Rise early, and retire to rest in good season. Regularity in food and sleep is a great preservative of health.
Be not afraid of fatigue. That kind of exercise is best which employs body and mind. A walk in connexion with active business, or to relieve the necessities of the destitute, is worth ten walks merely for exercise.
Very many humours and diseases originate in a want of personal cleanliness. Wash your whole person thoroughly, at least once or twice a week; and rub yourself with a coarse towel, or brush, till the surface glows. This is particularly salutary for those who sew a good deal, or lead any kind of sedentary life. If done at night, it is apt to induce refreshing sleep. Consumption might in many cases be prevented by proper regard to this suggestion.
Clean your teeth with a brush and cold water in the morning, and rinse them once or twice a day; above all, have them clean when you go to bed, that they may not collect impurities during the night. To chew charcoal slowly once or twice a week, sweetens the breath, and tends to preserve the teeth from decay; it will sometimes even arrest it when begun. To use it merely as a tooth-powder is far less salutary. Toothpicks, by keeping the teeth well separated and cleansed, help to preserve them. Metal ones are injurious; those made of quill are uncleanly, being commonly kept for some time; the best ones are made of willow, or some pliable wood, they do not hurt the gums, and are thrown away when used. All substances very hot, or very cold, are hurtful to the teeth; likewise smoking and chewing tobacco; and too free use of very sweet articles, and excess of animal food.
The frequent use of a fine ivory comb is not good for the hair. It is better to wash the head often in cool water, and brush it very thoroughly. If the hair comes out very much, sea-water, or water with salt dissolved in it, is much recommended as a frequent bath. Cleanliness is advisable for the hair as well as for other parts of the body.
Wash the eyes thoroughly in cold water. Do not sew, or read, at twilight, or by too dazzling light. If far-sighted, read with rather less light, and with the book somewhat nearer to the eye, than you desire; if near-sighted, read with a book as far off as possible, gradually increasing the distance at which the book is held. In this manner near-sightedness is cured in Russia, where it is very prevalent, but the practice must be adopted from an early period, in order that it may be successful. Both these imperfections may be thus diminished. When long-sightedness is dependent on age, it cannot be removed.
If flannel has been worn, choose the morning of a mild day to remove it, and be careful about exposure to the cold for some days after.
If stockings and shoes get wet, change them. It is a mistaken idea to dry them on.
Be careful not to put on clothes before they are well aired. Avoid sitting upon the damp ground, or sleeping in damp sheets.
A feather-bed is the safest place in a severe thunderstorm. The middle of the room is a better seat than near windows, or fireplaces. Metals attract lightning. Trees are an unsafe shelter,
After exposure to severe cold, do not suddenly approach a fire, or drink hot drinks; but acquire warmth very gradually.
If you find yourself seriously ill, send for a good physician-one who understands his profession.
Hints To Nurses And The Sick
THE first and most important duty of the nurse is to follow scrupulously and exactly the directions of the physician. Let no facts be concealed from him, or only half told. Let no entreaties of the patient, or faith in your own experience, induce you to counteract his orders. If a person be trusted at all in this capacity, he must be trusted entirely; for health, and even life, may be sacrificed by different individuals trying experiments unknown to each other. If you think of anything which seems an improvement upon his practice, suggest it to him, and mention your reasons.
Keep the chamber well aired. Fevers are often prolonged by an unreasonable timidity about fresh air. The only precaution that is necessary is to keep your patient out of the current of it, and away from damp walls. Garments and bedclothes should be changed more frequently in sickness than in health, and always carefully aired. If the patient is too ill to have his clothes changed every night and morning, they should be washed the oftener.
The personal cleanliness of the sick is of very great importance. The face, hands, and neck, should be washed with lukewarm soap and water every day; do not let this be neglected from an unreasonable superstition about taking cold; there is not the slightest danger of this, provided the patient be kept from a draught of air, and is not allowed to remain long wet. The feet should often be bathed with warm soap and water, dried with a soft cloth, and immediately covered up. Where it is possible, the hair should be combed, and the teeth brushed every day; if weakness prevent this, let the teeth and tongue be washed with a fine linen cloth.
It is an unspeakable comfort to feverish and nervous patients to have their face, hands, and feet frequently sponged with warm water. It promotes moisture of the skin, and often induces a sweet sleep; even gentle rubbing with the hand is often quieting. In cases of high fever it is very refreshing to sponge the entire person with a solution made of one tea-spoonful of pearlash, dissolved in a pint of lukewarm water-afterwards wiped off with a fresh sponge dipped in warm vinegar and water. [Patients with fever and hot skin, frequently derive great relief from the application of vinegar and water, without the previous employment of pearlash]. Weakly and consumptive patients are benefited by being washed in warm white rum.
Remove all impurities from the room immediately, and make use of the chloride of lime [solution from time to time].
Frequently wash the glass, crockery, and spoons that are used in a sick chamber, and do it with as little noise as possible. Keep them covered with a clean towel.
Sweep with a hand-brush and dusting-pan, to avoid dust and noise.
Fading Away by Henry Peach Robinson, 1858
Let food be prepared in perfectly clean vessels, and served up to the patient in the neatest and most agreeable manner; a sticky spoon, or a greasy bowl, will often quite destroy the feeble appetite. All nourishment for the sick should be made fresh; when warmed over, it tastes less pleasantly, and is not so wholesome. Never first taste the food yourself, or blow upon it, lest it disgust the invalid. When necessary to taste it, to ascertain its warmth or seasoning, put away the spoon you use, without dipping it a second time.
Wash your hands frequently; and use your fingers as little as possible in preparing food or medicine. Always carry a towel under the food or medicines offer.
Let no importunities persuade you to indulge a patient in forbidden food; if this give great offence, inform the physician, and ascertain if any pleasant change can be safely devised. In all diseases, the safest side to err upon is keeping the diet low and mild.
Do every thing as quietly as possible. Step lightly and gently; avoid creaking shoes, rustling garments, and banging doors; have hinges and locks oiled; lay the coal or wood upon the fire with your hand, protected by an old glove. A slight jarring of the bed, or the unfolding of dry paper, sometimes makes a nervous patient restless for the whole night. The buzzing sound of whispering in the room is often even more distressing than loud talk. A sudden stream of light from an opened shutter, or a candle placed where the light can be seen, is often perfect torment.
Use no snuff, or any article of food, the smell of which may be offensive to weak nerves. As for ardent spirit, no person who tastes it is fit to minister to the sick.
Do not ask unnecessary questions. Avoid the repetition of what you perceive to be irritating. If the mind be wandering, appear to fall in with the train of thought, and do not fatigue the patient by asking explanations. Keep a cheerful countenance. Tell no gloomy stories about fatal accidents, especially such as occurred under the very circumstances in which the invalid is placed; incalculable mischief is often done by exciting the imagination in this way, especially during pregnancy [and the confinement].
Under the head of gloomy remarks, I do not mean to include Christian conversation concerning another world. Where it is a settled case that a human being is departing, I have always thought it kind to talk openly, and with serious cheerfulness, of the prospect before him. In these particulars, however, a nurse must be guided by the wishes of relations and friends.
Preparations for the night should be made early in the evening; for if a drowsy patient is disturbed with whispering, stirring the fire, passing in and out, &c., it often breaks up sleep for the whole night.
Be very careful to get exact directions respecting the food and medicine to be taken during the night: it is prudent to make a memorandum of them. Be scrupulous in measuring medicines: it is best the physician should see the size of the spoon you intend to use. In extreme illness, important results often depend upon not varying five minutes in the prescribed time of giving medicines. It is well to keep a record of what occurs between the physician’s visits, that he may accurately know the progress of the disease.
Always have a second lamp in the room, and facilities for obtaining hot and cold water.
Unless especially instructed so to do, never wake an invalid from sleep to administer nourishment. Guard their slumbers well; for “Sleep is tired nature’s sweet restorer.”
In preparing medicines, remove the sticks and pods from senna; other seed from [lin] seed; dirt from roots; and all mouldy or musty parts from herbs.
When the feet are put in warm water, have the limbs [and body] well protected by blankets or flannels. Wipe one foot dry with a warm cloth, and put on a warm stocking, before the other foot is taken from the water. If the water becomes cool, add warmth to itbeing careful not to scald.
When a patient is to be rubbed, it is better to use mittens of flannel, because they present a more even and agreeable surface than a cloth that slips about in your hand. Do not rub backward and forward, and be careful not to injure the skin.
When you make the bed, arrange the feathers so that the head and shoulders will be elevated; and tuck in the under sheet well. Feather beds and pillows are heating when fever is present; mattresses, or straw beds, and hair pillows, should be obtained.
Have something to throw over the patient’s shoulders when sitting up. Support the back with a footstool or chair behind the pillow, and let the feet have something firm to press against. Change of posture oftentimes affords inexpressible relief.
When an invalid walks with difficulty, he may be drawn from the bed to the fire in a rocking-chair, comfortably arranged with blankets and pillows. See that the shoes are warmed in readiness; and if pillows are brought from another room, have them well aired. Rocking-chair gently tipped back, and securely supported by blocks, is an easy position for the weak. [The reclining chair at present in use will afford great relief by the changes of position which it allows an invalid, and which may be made with but little trouble, and without giving rise to any uneasy sensations.]
Sick Girl by Christian Krohg
When a person is too feeble to sit up long, have two sets of pillows, sheets, and blankets, that one set may be aired in readiness to put on.
If an invalid is removed from his own bed to one beside it, have the head of the second bed placed toward the foot of the first. The patient will thus be laid in the same direction after moving, as before; and much unnecessary fatigue, and awkward lifting, will be avoided.
If the patient cannot be moved from the bed at all, half the sheet can be turned over in smooth folds; a warm clean one can be substituted, with one-half of it likewise in smooth folds; the patient can then be moved to the clean side.
In common cases, a good nurse can judge when a gentle emetic, or cathartic, or cooling beverage, is necessary; how much exercise is salutary; and when a cheerful guest may be admitted. Loud, rapid talkers, and excitable nervous visitors should in no case be admitted into the sick chamber. That you may know what to avoid, observe the countenance and pulse of your patient, the temperature of the skin, and the effect of food.
A really good nurse must have a tender conscience, as well as a feeling heart. She must feel convinced that the slightest deviation from truth, even to screen herself from blame, is not only a violation of the trust reposed in her, but is a sin against God.
When her patience is severely taxed by unreasonable caprices, she must remember how sickness weakens the mind, and try to apply the golden rule.
When infants are fretful, she must beware of the temptation to administer opiates. To endanger the health, or dim the intellect of a human being, for the sake of temporary convenience, is a fearful responsibility.
[Too many instances have occurred of late in which a contrary line of practice on the part of the nurse has been attended with the most fatal results. Whenever it is deemed necessary to give the infant an anodyne, other than by the express direction of the medical attendant, by whom in such a case the proper quantity only will be sent, it will be essentially requisite to ascertain the strength and dose of the syrup of poppies or diacodium, which is used, as they are not often met with possessing exactly the same quantity of opium in two shops.]
Invalids too, have … duties to perform. Giving of necessity a great deal of trouble, they should endeavour to diminish it as much as possible. They are bound to pay a kind regard to the comfort and convenience of those who nurse them. This may be shown by complaining as little as possible; by a pleasant acknowledgment of affectionate attentions; by trying to think of all they want while the nurse is up, that they may not be obliged to call her from her chair the moment she is seated; by swallowing disagreeable medicines without any unnecessary annoyance; and by not coaxing her for food, which the doctor has forbidden.
I’m super excited that my writer bestie, Tina Whittle, is visiting my humble little blog! Although Tina writes fabulous (like critically acclaimed and starred reviews kind of fabulous) contemporary mysteries, she relies on research from the past to enrich her stories. Tina and I have talked about our contrasting research styles over the years. She adores research and is quite happy spending hours drifting down the rabbit hole of a particular subject. Despite having a blog about history, I am not so fond of research. I approach my blog more like a crow collecting a shiny object. Look what I found!
So, you will see her research style in full bloom here as she meticulously covers nineteenth-century mourning fashion in America.
And if clever, character-driven mysteries with sparkling dialogue are your cup of tea/shot of whiskey/happy gummy, then read her fantastic Tai Randolph & Trey Seaver series! Here is a fabulous review by the noted mystery reviewer Dru Ann Love of the latest Tai & Trey book Crooked Ways.
The Victorian era—which spans the reign of Queen Victoria, a period beginning in 1837 and concluding with the queen’s death in 1901—saw not only significant discoveries in science and technology, but also tumultuous cultural changes, especially in the attitudes and practices concerning death.
No greater example exists than the queen herself. Upon the death of her husband Prince Albert in 1861, Queen Victoria went into deep mourning. She stayed in seclusion for many years, rarely appearing in public, and wore widow’s black for the remaining forty years of her life. This concept of personalized mourning—and the associated cultural norms that shaped and were shaped by it—became a signature aspect of the era, especially in the United Kingdom.
Victorian-styled mourning was not limited to Great Britain, however—its influence spanned the globe and found a unique expression in the United States. 1861 was also a significant date in American history, as April of that year saw the official beginning of the American Civil War, a four-year period that ended with approximately 620,000 military deaths—two-thirds by disease—and 50,000 civilian deaths (Livermore et al).
No family was untouched. No community went unscathed. Death was not just a frequent visitor, but an ever-present one. Nineteenth-century openness about grief and mourning—supported by codes of conduct and dress, especially for women—may seem odd in contemporary times. Yet these customs provided structure when many social and political institutions were either crumbling or being reconstructed. As limiting as some of the prescribed rules were, they also provided a socially acceptable opportunity to mourn, to grieve, and to be fully present with devastating personal loss.
It is important to note that some of the most informative preserved historical artifacts of that time are ephemera: items like funeral cards and private notes which were not originally designed to be retained or preserved. It is also important to remember that for the most part, these artifacts document the mourning practices of white persons of social and material privilege; how communities of color adapted, adopted, and transformed white mourning culture—and preserved their own traditional practices while doing so—has been less well documented.
When those of us walking about in the twenty-first century think about Victorian mourning, the first thing that typically comes to mind is the color black, with good reason: it was the color that dominated funeral fashion, especially for women. Black wasn’t limited to mourning wear—and mourning wear wasn’t limited to black—but it did provide a key through-line for all mourning practices, including dress, jewelry, stationery, photography, and home décor.
The manner in which the color black was used depended on many factors, but one of the most important was time and the grieving person’s relationship to the departed. Nineteen-century mourning was a process with defined stages, though those stages varied depending on locale, social station, and current etiquette, which changed dramatically through the century.
In her bookManners and Social Usages, Mrs. John M. E. W. Sherwood explains that wearing black serves both a symbolic and practical purpose: “Custom . . . has decreed that we shall wear black, as a mark of respect to those we have lost, and as a shroud for ourselves, protesting against the gentle ministration of light and cheerfulness with which our Lord ever strives to reach us. . . . A mourning dress does protect a woman while in deepest grief against the untimely gayety of a passing stranger. It is a wall, a cell of refuge. Behind a black veil she can hide herself as she goes out for business or recreation, fearless of any intrusion.”
Mark A. Anderson Collection of Post-Mortem Photography William L. Clements Library. The University of Michigan, Ann Arbor Mourning Fashion – UM Clements Library
The William L. Clements Library at the University of Michigan explored the ritual of mourning dress in their exhibit “So Once Were We”: Death in Early America: “Women would move from periods of “deep” to “ordinary” to “light” mourning. Each stage had its own accepted fashions. Deep mourning took place immediately after the death. Women would wear black dresses and bonnets without decorative trims. Black veils, crepe on their dresses, gloves, shoes, and accessories were also black. During ordinary mourning, women could abandon the veil and crepe, introduce ornate jewelry and add white trim to dresses. Lilac, purple, and gray were permissible when a woman entered light mourning. Men were not expected to adhere to rigid mourning rules. Following the burial, they were expected to return to work in order to support the family. Men could wear a long crepe band on his hat called a “weeper.” The width of the weeper around his hat represented his relationship with the deceased. Other optional men’s fashions included black armbands or a black ribbon on the lapel.
The time-frames for stages of mourning and the lengths of those stages varied by community and family. The following suggests typical mourning periods:
In the last two decades of the nineteenth-century, author A.B. Philputt differentiated between the wearing of mourning garments as an expression of grief and as an expression of fashion, explaining that while the former has no strict timetable, the latter certainly does. From her guidebook American Etiquette and Rules of Politeness:“In the United States no prescribed periods for wearing mourning garments have been fixed upon. When grief is profound no rules are needed. But where persons wear mourning for style and not for feeling, there is a need of fixed rules.”
Philputt lays out one rule of thumb based on relation to the deceased:
2 years of mourning for a deceased husband
1 year of mourning for deceased parents
1 year of mourning for deceased children
6 months of mourning for deceased grandparents
6 months of mourning for deceased friends when the mourner received an inheritance
6 months of mourning for deceased siblings
3 months of mourning for deceased aunts and uncles
Regional differences were also noted. Godey’s Magazine— alternatively known as Godey’s Magazine and Lady’s Book—noted these in 1857:
“We have at length found space to redeem the promise made, some time since, to give more extended details of the present styles adopted in mourning. As our readers very well know, there is “deep mourning” and “second mourning.” The latter is adopted for a distant relative, or by those who have previously worn close black. A widow, of course, wears the first style; but many wear almost the same for the loss of a parent, brother, sister, or child. A widow’s mourning, though, strange to say, is the only close black relieved by any white for the past year or two, Fashion graciously permits her a close white cap about the face, “a widow’s cap,” as it is called, of plain lawn or muslin as a double border, formed by two extremely narrow puffs of the same, slightly rounded by passing a rodthrough when newly made or “done up.” This is not generally adopted, as yet, in our own country, though many wear them; but bonnet-caps in the same style are as universal for widows as a double crape veil.
All others in first mourning are indeed in deep black the present season. Collars, sleeves, bonnet-caps, and strings were of tarleton or French muslin, a short time since. Crape and black thulle have done away with these materials. Black crape collars are worn by all, lightened with thulle insertions and frills, if the taste inclines to display, rather than simple severity. Bows of the same, or ruches of black thulle and blonde, form also the bonnet-cap; the strings are of double crape, or black ribbon, as may be. Bonnet composed entirely of crape, or bombazine, according to choice. The last are generally relieved by folds of English crape, though sometimes even this is not done.
In Philadelphia, severity and neatness carry the day; in New York, many do not scruple to mingle jets and bugles, crape flowers and feathers, even in what they call deep mourning. For ourselves, we think the present taste is to lighten a garb, grave, at best, by color rather than ornament. Philadelphians are inclined to carry mourning to extremes, however, much more than any of their Atlantic neighbors; they keep their shutters bowed and their veils down much longer than the New Yorker or the Bostonian. In New York, it is too gay; in Boston, fashion is by no means so arbitrary as elsewhere. People are inclined to have minds of their own, and follow feeling and convenience rather than form. If good taste is sometimes sacrificed in this way, we must put up with it.
Black cloth cloaks, with a double row of stitching, separated by a space of half an inch, are the neatest outer-garments we have seen in this department, and were brought out, we believe, by Jackson, whose mourning store is to be found in Broadway near the Metropolitan.
In Philadelphia, Madame Besson and her successors have an old and just reputation for the quality and color of their materials. Nearly all large dry-goods men have now a mourning department. Cloth cloaks, more or less trimmed—and Brodie has furnished some of the plainest and most tasteful, with all his taste for richness and ornament displayed in colors—mantles of bombazine, or any of the materials now taking its place, trimmed with crape, and long shawls of Thibet cloth, are the general wear. The last have fringe, or a ribbon binding, as best suits the fancy. A sack, or worsted Sontag (half handkerchief, knit on bone or wooden needles), will be found very comfortable beneath them, as they are scarcely warm enough in this northern climate for February and indeed March.
The principal dress fabrics are bombazine, Tanese cloth, alpaca with bombazine finish, Canton cloth, etc. etc., differing in finish and price; plain merino, cashmere, and mousseline are also used for the house or street. For morning-dresses, there are a variety of plaids, neatly printed mousselines, chintzes, and ginghams. For travelling, serges, mohair, and many other mixed and serviceable materials. Formorning or travelling-dresses, where crape would soon spot or rust, plain Mantua ribbon, of one broad or several narrow widths, is much used; also a variety of galloons and braid manufactured expressly for this department.
Undersleeves are of crape, tissue, or grenadine, in plain puffs, gathered into a close band at the wrist, or heavily trimmed with black braid, narrow crape folds, etc., when a less severe taste is exercised. Large puffs and falls of black thulle are also worn in deep mourning by those who care more for the graceful and becoming than rigid simplicity.
As a principle of good taste, ornaments used in mourning should be few and plain. Jet seems the most appropriate; and this has excellent imitations, scarcely to be detected. We have brooches and bracelets of jet set in gold, in gold and black enamel, or cast in plain knots, leaves, or bands. The oval brooch for hair is frequently the only ornament worn. This is usually surrounded by a rim of small jets, and many have an outer rim of pearls. Plainer brooches of gold and black enamel are still much in vogue.
Handkerchiefs of the sheerest cambric have either a broad plain hem or a black border printed. Of the last, there are a great variety to select from. An embroidered pocket-handkerchief would be as much out of taste as a Valenciennes collar.”
Etiquette maven Florence Hartley agreed with the idea that the progression of mourning wear did not conform to one set of rules. In her book The Ladies’ Book of Etiquette, and Manual of Politeness. A Complete Hand Book for the Use of the Lady in Polite Society, she wrote, “There is such a variety of opinion upon the subject of mourning that it is extremely difficult to lay down any general rules upon the subject. Some wear very close black for a long period for a distant relative whilst others will wear dressy mourning for a short time in a case of death in the immediate family. There is no rule either for the depth of mourning or the time when it may be laid aside and I must confine my remarks to the different degrees of mourning.”
On second mourning, she wrote, “Here a straw bonnet, trimmed with black ribbon or crape flowers, or a silk bonnet with black flowers on the outside, and white ones in the face, a black silk dress, and gray shawl or cloak, may be worn. Lead color, purple, lavender, and white, are all admissible in second mourning, and thedress may be lightened gradually, a white bonnet, shawl, and light purple or lavender dress, being the dress usually worn last, before the mourning is thrown aside entirely, and colors resumed. It is especially to be recommended to buy always the best materials when making up mourning.”
Crape and woolen goods of the finest quality are very expensive, but a cheaper article will wear miserably; there is no greater error in economy than purchasing cheap mourning, for no goods are so inferior, or wear out and grow rusty so soon.”
The social pressure equating depth of grief with the outward display of it forced many a bereaved woman to purchasing clothing she could ill afford. Godey’s Magazine elaborates on this dilemma: “We quarrel with the fashion, but not the custom of mourning: though even this has, until of late, been too arbitrary, forcing those, whose means would not allow the additional expense, into making it at a time when money could least be spared. The poorest, and those who are more to be pitied than the absolute poor, those who try to conceal straitened means, and keep up an appearance of comfort, were thus forced into expenditures that required the pinching and saving of months, and sometimes years, if met at all.
We quarrel with the fashion, which judges of grief by the depth of a fold, that brings remark or censure upon a widow as to whether she wears her veil up or down—and, indeed, for delicate eyes or lungs, a widow’s veil is certain injury if kept over the face; that is agonized by a white collar when black crepe is the style; that modifies shades according to weeks or months, instead of softened feeling; that puts on black for a third cousin, because becoming, and lays it aside at Newport for a fancy ball; or counterfeits it by a mockery of white tarleton, with violet streamers, and marabou feathers tipped with the same shade; or goes glistening in bugles and jet to the gayest entertainments.”
In fine, neatness and simplicity, which we have so often urged on our readers as the first principles of good taste, are the best guides in selecting mourning, and “the best is most assuredly the cheapest.”
Brooklyn Museum Costume Collection at The Metropolitan Museum of Art, Gift of the Brooklyn Museum, 2009; Gift of Martha Woodward Weber
The societal pressure to mourn in an appropriately outfitted manner was keenly felt by women of modest means, especially those put into such circumstances by the loss of a breadwinner husband. One such woman, Julia Sherman of New Hampshire, wrote a letter to her sister showing the struggle that women of modest means would go through to adhere to social standards for mourning. Following the death of her husband, Sherman’s mother-in-law would not let her borrow the appropriate black clothes. As a result, Sherman borrowed a blue-black shawl and purchased cheaper clothing to dye (thibet cloth, in this case, which according to Frank P. Bennett & Company’s Woolen and Worsted Fabrics Glossary was a fabric that at lower prices was made from wool, cotton, and shoddy—a fabric recycled from shredded rags and leftover fabric clippings—and which had a “raw and thready appearance” and a “strong affinity for all the dust and lint in one’s vicinity”):
“I had clothes which E gave me when he sold out which I have exchanged in the store for mourning goods and have been able thus far to pay for every thing I have had nor has an article been offered me although I have borrowed a shawl in the store to wear a few times until I could get one colored although mother has one like it she has not ever offered to lend it to me even on the day I most needed it and had to wear a blue black one which was borrowed for me. She wore her jet black one which father gave her this summer and like which they have them in the store they are small thibet and 3.50 which I thot I could not afford to get and have sent the [ ] with my de laine to both be colored – I merely mention this to show you the difference that could be if our dear dear mother was living.”
Mourning fashion, like all fashion, was not a static thing. While the color black maintained its dominance, other aspects went through changes based on economics, cultural shifts, and the availability of certain fabrics and accessories (especially crape, the most traditional and most dependably appropriate of the various suitable fabrics). Hemlines and collars changed with the times, as did cuffs and caps, gloves and bonnets.
Location also played a role in what was considered proper mourning attire. Sherwood in particular noted the differences between American mourning fashion and European fashion, especially English:
“The English, from whom we borrow our fashion in funeral matters, have a limitation provided by social law which is a useful thing. They now decree that crape shall only be worn six months, even for the nearest relative, and that the duration of mourning shall not exceed a year. A wife’s mourning for her husband is the most conventionally deep mourning allowed, and every one who has seen an English widow will agree that she makes a “hearse” of herself. Bombazine and crape, a widow’s cap; and a long; thick veil–such is the modern English idea. Some widows even have the cap made of black crape lisse, but it is generally of white. In this country a widow’s first mourning dresses are covered almost entirely with crape, a most costly and disagreeable material, easily ruined by the dampness and dust—a sort of penitential and self-mortifying dress, and very ugly and very expensive. There are now, however, other and more agreeable fabrics which also bear the dead black, lustreless look which is alone considered respectful to the dead, and which are not so costly as crape, or so disagreeable to wear. The Henrietta cloth and imperial serges are chosen for heavy winter dresses, while for those of less weight are tamise cloth, Bayonnaise, grenadine, nuns’ veiling, and the American silk.
Our mourning usages are not overloaded with what may be called the pomp, pride, and circumstance of woe which characterize English funerals. Indeed, so overdone are mourning ceremonies in England—what with the hired mutes, the nodding plumes, the costly coffin, and the gifts of gloves and bands and rings, etc. —that Lady Georgiana Milnor, of Nunappleton, in York, a great friend of the Archbishop, wrote a book against the abuse, ordered her own body to be buried in a pine coffin, and forbade her servants and relatives to wear mourning. Her wishes were carried out to the letter. A black, cloth-covered casket with silver mountings is considered in the best taste, and the pall-bearers are given at most a white scarf and a pair of black gloves. Even this is not always done. At one time the traffic in these returned bands and gloves was quite a fortune to the undertaker. Mourning is very expensive, and often costs a family more than they can well afford; but it is a sacrifice that even the poorest gladly make, and those who can least afford it often wear the best mourning, so tyrannical is custom. They consider it . . . an act of disrespect to the memory of the dead if the living are not clad in gloomy black.
However, our business is with the etiquette of mourning. Widows wear deep mourning, consisting of woollen stuffs and crape, for about two years, and sometimes for life, in America. Children wear the same for parents for one year, and then lighten it with black silk, trimmed with crape. Half-mourning gradations of gray, purple, or lilac have been abandoned, and, instead, combinations of black and white are used. Complimentary mourning is black silk without crape. The French have three grades of mourning–deep, ordinary, and half mourning. In deep mourning, woollen cloths only are worn; in ordinary mourning, silk and woollen; in half mourning, gray and violet. An American lady is always shocked at the gayety and cheerfulness of French mourning. In France, etiquette prescribes mourning for a husband for one year and six weeks–that is, six months of deep mourning, six of ordinary, and six weeks of half mourning. For a wife, a father, or a mother, six months–three deep and three half mourning; for a grandparent, two months and a half of slight mourning; for a brother or a sister, two months, one of which is in deep mourning; for an uncle or an aunt, three weeks of ordinary black. In America, with no fixity of rule, ladies have been known to go into deepest mourning for their own relatives or those of their husbands, or for people, perhaps, whom they have never seen, and have remained as gloomy monuments of bereavement for seven or ten years, constantly in black; then, on losing a child or a relative dearly loved, they have no extremity of dress left to express the real grief which fills their lives–no deeper black to go into. This complimentary mourning should be, as in the French custom, limited to two or three weeks. The health of a delicate child has been known to be seriously affected by the constant spectacle of his mother in deep mourning.
The period of a mourner’s retirement from the world has been very much shortened of late. For one year no formal visiting is undertaken, nor is there any gayety in the house. Black is often worn for a husband or wife two years, for parents one year, and for brothers and sisters one year; a heavy black is lightened after that period. Ladies are beginning to wear a small black gauze veil over the face, and are in the habit of throwing the heavy crape veil back over the hat. It is also proper to wear a quiet black dress when going to a funeral, although this is not absolutely necessary.”
“For lighter mourning jet is used on silk, and there is no doubt that it makes a very handsome dress. It is a singular fact that there is a certain comfort to some people in wearing very handsome black. Worth, on being asked to dress an American widow whom he had never seen, sent for her photograph, for he said that he wished to see “whether she was the sort of woman who would relish a becoming black.”
Very elegant dresses are made with jet embroidery on crape–the beautiful soft French crape–but lace is never “mourning.” Even the French, who have very light ideas on the subject, do not trim the most ornamental dresses with lace during the period of even second mourning, except when they put the woolen yak lace on a cloth cloak or mantilla. During a very dressy half mourning, however, black lace may be worn on white silk; but this is questionable. Diamond ornaments set in black enamel are allowed even in the deepest mourning, and also pearls set in black. The initials of the deceased, in black brilliants or pearls, are now set in lockets and sleeve-buttons, or pins. Gold ornaments are never worn in mourning.
White silk, embroidered with black jet, is used in the second stage of court mourning, with black gloves. Deep red is deemed in England a proper alternative for mourning black, if the wearer be called upon to go to a wedding during the period of the first year’s mourning. At St. George’s, Hanover Square, therefore, one may often see a widow assisting at the wedding of a daughter or a son, and dressed in a superb red brocade or velvet, which, directly the wedding is over, she will discard for her solemn black.
The question of black gloves is one which troubles all who are obliged to wear mourning through the heat of summer. The black kid glove is painfully warm and smutty, disfiguring the hand and soiling the handkerchief and face. The Swedish kid glove is now much more in vogue, and the silk glove is made with such neatness and with such a number of buttons that it is equally stylish, and much cooler and more agreeable.”
That most iconic item of mourning dress—the widow’s veil—remained a classic representation of deep mourning for decades, even if it was, as noted in Godey’s, known to cause “certain injury” if kept too long over the face due to the poisonous chemicals used to make and set the dyes that created the deep matte black color considered most desirable.
Sherwood noted the same: “The black veil . . . is most unhealthy: it harms the eyes and it injures the skin. As it rubs against the nose and forehead it is almost certain to cause abrasions, and often makes an annoying sore. To the eyes enfeebled by weeping it is sure to be dangerous, and most oculists now forbid it.”
Despite their dangers, respectable women of this period were expected to wear these veils—often referred to as “weeping veils”—over their faces as a ritual of deep mourning, though this requirement was lifted during the second (or half) mourning, and during ordinary mourning (and became less popular during the latter decades of the nineteenth-century). Some women chose to continue wearing the veil, while others moved into the next stage of mourning.
Mark A. Anderson Collection of Post-Mortem Photography William L. Clements Library. The University of Michigan, Ann Arbor Mourning Fashion – UM Clements Library
From Godey’s:
“A widow’s veil, then, is of double crape; and, no matter what the state of the atmosphere may be, woe to her if Mrs. Grundy should see her raise it before the proscribed twelve months have passed. She may breathe comfortably after that, if she chooses, or go on blinding and stifling herself three or five years, if she chooses. Others in deep mourning wear a single thickness and width, about a yard, ordinarily, and two yards long. The most graceful fashion is worn from one to two fingers in depth on each end; the veil is then thrown over the bonnet midway, as to length and breadth, and secured, by a black veil pin, in the bonnet on each side. Others adhere to a string of black ribbon run through the top hem, or a cap string.”
Despite the many rules and strictures and societal rigidities associated with the rituals of mourning wear—and the condemnation one might expect for flouting such—tastemakers of the time also decried the ostentatiousness of mourning.
Sherwood noted the following anecdote: “A gay young widow at Washington was once seen dancing at a reception, a few months after the death of her soldier husband, with a long black veil on, and holding in her black-gloved hand [a] handkerchief, which looked as if it had been dipped in ink. “She should have dipped it in blood,” said a by-stander. Under such circumstances we learn how much significance is to be attached to the grief expressed by a mourning veil.”
Sherwood continues: “[F]or the mockery, the conventional absurdities, and the affectations which so readily lend themselves to caricature in the name of mourning, no condemnation can be too strong. There is a ghoul-like ghastliness in talking about “ornamental,” or “becoming,” or “complimentary” mourning. People of sense, of course, manage to dress without going to extremities in either direction. We see many a pale-faced mourner whose quiet mourning-dress tells the story of bereavement without giving us the painful feeling that crape is too thick, or bombazine too heavy, for comfort. Exaggeration is to be deprecated in mourning as in everything.
The discarding of mourning should be effected by gradations. It shocks persons of good taste to see a light-hearted young widow jump into colors, as if she had been counting the hours. If black is to be dispensed with, let its retirement be slowly and gracefully marked by quiet costumes, as the feeling of grief, yielding to the kindly influence of time, is shaded off into resignation and cheerfulness. We do not forget our dead, but we mourn for them with a feeling which no longer partakes of anguish.
Of course, no one can say that a woman should not wear mourning all her life if she choose, but it is a serious question whether in so doing she does not injure the welfare and happiness of the living. Children, as we have said, are often strangely affected by this shrouding of their mothers, and men always dislike it.
Common-sense and common decency, however, should restrain the frivolous from engaging much in the amusements and gayeties of life before six months have passed after the death of any near friend. If they pretend to wear black at all, they cannot be too scrupulous in respecting the restraint which it imposes.”
Though we in contemporary times may look at these practices as outdated and unnecessarily restrictive—a sentiment no doubt shared by many female mourners during the Victorian era—understanding the role that fashion played in recognizing and honoring grief can help us do the same today. Even if we don’t have prescribed mourning schedules or a matte black wardrobe, we can find the symbols that help us process loss both culturally and personally, that usher us through the transitions we will all face with more intentionality and presence.
Tina Whittle is a mystery writer living and working in the Georgia Lowcountry. Her Tai Randolph & Trey Seaver series—featuring intrepid not-quite-professional sleuth Tai and her ex-SWAT partner Trey—has garnered starred reviews in Kirkus, Publisher’s Weekly, Booklist, and Library Journal.
A two-time nominee for Georgia Author of the Year and a Derringer finalist, Tina enjoys birdwatching, eating sushi, and reading tarot cards—she does not enjoy running, but does it anyway. You can find her online at https://www.tinawhittle.com.
Tai Randolph doesn’t like tailing adulterers. Or photographing cracked sidewalks. Or staking out insurance scammers.
But being an apprentice PI means doing what she’s told, filling out paperwork, and following the rules, all the rules. It’s a bit chafing for someone whose amateur sleuthing playbook included dodging, lying, and occasional light blackmail.
But then her past comes knocking. Literally.
After a decade in the wind, Tai’s Aunt Rowena reappears, and she’s convinced someone is trying to kill Beauregard Boone, the complicated ex-felon at the heart of Tai’s twisted family tree. It’s an intriguing case, even if it means returning to the coastal islands of Savannah, Georgia, a city that keeps breaking her heart over and over again.
Not that life in Atlanta is uncomplicated. Trey Seaver—her partner in both romance and crime solving—is keeping a secret. Her new job comes with a moral rectitude clause, so she has to be on her best behavior at all times. And unless she scrapes together some extra bucks, the electric bill is going to be paid late. Again.
But in Savannah, all she has to worry about is vehicular homicide, flying bullets, and an enemy who has been laying low for a long long time. Tai’s got a choice to make. Safety and security where the only danger is boredom? Or risk and reward where the consequences could be deadly?
