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American boys by the 1850s were no longer wearing long tunics, although the style had evolved into a kind of tunic jacket which was popular. The tunic-style jackets often had embroidered designs. These andother suits often had fanciful designs. The collars worn by boys grew increasingly small in the 1850s, in sharp contrast to the collars boys wore in the earlier and latter period of the decade. Shirts or waists all had long, commonly blousey sleeves. Boys commonly wore long trousers, generally quite baggy. Some younger boys began to be seen in shortened-length trousers, bloomer knickers bloused below the knee. The cut was generally but well below the knee. Long trousers were most common, but fashionably dressed boys from affluent families did wear the new bloomer knickers. Some boys might also wore long pants well above the ankles, but this may have been primarily the result of boys outgrowing their clothes and the high cost of replacing them--not a fashion statement.
Our knowlege of 1850s boys headwear is still very limited. And is complicated by the difficulty in dating the available Daguerreotypes. While Dags cannot be dated very precisely, Anrotypes are much easier to date. We see boys wearing both hats and caps. Hats seem the most common and we see several different types of hats. The most common type of hat in the 1850s was the rounded crown hats we at first noticed in the 1840s. Most of the dags and ambros we have found from the 50s do not show headwear. Thus we are not entirely sure about the range of these rounded hat styles, especially the brims. We also see flat top hats. Boys did not wear the famous stove-pipe caps, but we see some boys with hats much highter than boaters. We are not sure just what to call these hats. As a result of the 49er Gold Rush in Califonia, we begin to see a substanial entry of Ecuadorean straw hats, usally called Panamas. We also notice a few caps, but there was not very many different types. Caps do not seem as common as hats, but they were worn many boys. A peaked military style we first saw during the Napoleonic Wars and wirn during the Mexican War seems ti have been the most common style. The Civil War kepi was not yet worn. The Mexican War wtyle caps were worn in the 1850s, but not very commonly in the 60s. They did not, however, entirely disappear for boys. Both the Federal and Confederate soldiers used the kepi as their uniform caps in the Civil War which began in 1861.
Little boys continued to wear dresses like their sisters. We see even more phoographic images in the 1850s. We have relatively few precisely dated images. There were not yet any distinctive boy styles. The images we note are show boys wearing esentially the same dresse as thir sisters. We do not know of any contemporary written material on this issue. The images that we have, however, show boys wearing dresses with no distinctive boy styling. Boys wear styles with low necklines as girls did at the time. A good example of this is an unidentified folk art portrait that we believe was painted in the 1850s. Except for the short hair and boyish face, we would have assumed it ws a girl. Not only do we have Dags, but Ambros and tin-types as well by the 1850s. A good example is an unidentified Vermont boy wearing a plaid dress with a low neckline. . And we also see portraits fom naive artists. L. Moulten painted an unidentified boy wearing a tunic in 1853. An artist named Wybeant let us several portraits of unidentified children wearing dresses in the 1850s.
Much more information becomes available with the development of photography. Larger numbers of images exist from the 1850s. They are not all Dags, we also see new formats, including Ambritypes and tintype. Most Ambros were taken in the 1850s or very early 60s so this may help us identify 1850s styles. We have noted quite a few American boys wearing tunics during the 1850s. It seems to have been one of the most popular outfits for boys. A substantial number of photographs first becomes available in the 1850s. Quite a number of the early images show boys wearing tunics that look somewhat like shirts, although often the image quality is not very good or details obscured. Most of the photogrphs we have found show boys wearing long pants with these tunics, but fashion plates often show bloomer knickers. The detinction is the length and front buttoning. A good example is an unidentified New York boy wearing a green plaid tunic. I think plaid may have been used to give it a kilt look. Another example is unidentified boy, probably in the mid- to late-1850s. Another good example is an unidentified boy. His tunic had a very large belt buckle. A problem vwe have, however, is that we do not yet have the capability of destinguising between 1840s and 50s dags and so msny dags are not dated. One interesting topic is the color of the tunics. We note a beautiful tinted Dag of an unidentified Baltimore family. with the tunic done in blue. A reader writes, "I read not too long ago that there was increased inerest in Russian and Turkish clothing styles as a result of the Crimean War (1854-56). Could this have influenced the appearance of tunics and Russian blouces in the United StatesS? Also, another influence may have been women wearing bloomer type baggy pants." The problem here is since photography only appeared in the 1840s, we are not sure what earlier styles were. We do not have a photograohic record to compare. We do know that tunics were not a new garments in the 1840s. From sketchy information I think tunics were fairly common throughout the early-19th century, at least among fashionable city boys. The Crimean War may have affected styling of the tunics. This we are unsure about. Of course the primary influence would have been in Britain and France, but American fashions atthe time were strongly influenced by Britain and France. We note an unidentified boy, we think in the 1850s, wearing a tunic suit with matching long pants.
unidentified American boy. This style became much less popular in the 1860s.
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Many American boys upon being, during the 1850s, might wear quite adult-looking suits. In fact in many ways the boy of the 1850s might wear clothes that look more modern to us than those worn later in the century. Some boys' suits while looking relatively dull might have some distinctive features such as military-looking buttons. We note many boys not precisely wearing suits with matching jacket and triosers, but rarher the jacket and trousers in contrasting materials. We note different styles of jackets. Some have rather a military look and button at the collar. A goof example here are the boys in an unidentified American family. We also note more modern looking jackets with lapels. A good example here is E.V. Grisen. The use of buttons was highly varoable on these suit jackets.
We know much more about the mid-19th century when photographic images become available. The greatly increased number of images at that time provide a great deal of information on shirt-like garments and collars. Shirts with small collars seem the dominant type at mid-century, but we do see soiome larger collars as well. The collars were mostly part of the shirt and not detachanle, an inovation that appeared at the end of the 1940s. All shirts had long sleeves. Many blouced at the wrist cuff, but less elaborately than in the 40s. Younger boys had shirts which buttoned on to their pants. Most boys wore their shirts buttoned at the collar, often without neckwear. Most shirts seem to have been plain, light colors. We see many portraits of boys having their portrait taken wearing shirts without jackets. This proably means thast they did not have suit jackets. This was much less common in the 60s which probably is a reflection of growing affluence in America.
unidentified American family.
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Younger boys even after breeching did not wear suits. Suits were not as common for boys as they becamne in the 1860s. We see younger boys wearing various tiops. Some look rther like blouses with fancy styling. We are noit sure what they were called at the time, but in many instances we can see collared or long-sleeved garments underneated. We can only collect images of these tops to develop information. There was a great variety of these tops. Ready made clothing was no available to ant extent before the Civil War (1861-65). Clothing for younger children was commonly sewed at home or purchased in millaneries. This meant that there was much more variety in the first half of the centuruy than the second half.
Neckwear for boys seems less common in the 1850s when collars became very small. The standard neckwear was the stock. Stocks were uually black, but we see some boys wearing brightly colored, patterned stocks. That was sometjhing that was not very common in the 1840s. And when tied that often looked somewhat like bows with tails rather than the partain stocks worn by adult men. These coloful stocks seem to be mostly for boys rather thsn these colorful stocks, but this needs to be pursued in more detail. We do know tht the black stocks were much more common for men and very common. Most men wore them when wearing suits. Very young boys did not wear them, but by about age 10 years or so we see boys wearing them as well at least when dresing up. The photographic record shows, however, that many boys did not have suits. We see, however, a lot more boys wearing suits than in the 40s. We suspect that if they if not wear a suit to the photograpohic studio, that meant they did not have one. Thus most boys did not wear stocks of ogher neckwer in the 50s. The standard stock was tied without tails. which essentially destunguished them from a bow. We note boys with stocks that were done with bows or at least a hint of tails. The Ambtotype appears about 1855. While it is difficult to sparate Dags from the 1840s abd 50s. Here Dags are diffiult to date, but Ambros are easier. Like Dags, few are actually dated. That is tht Ambros arefrom aelatively narro time period, either from the 1850s or very early-60s. Ambros appeared in the mid-50s and thus date from the mid-50s. Even so, there are many of thm because Americans as they began to industrialize were increasingly ffluent. and Amnbros brought down the cost of photography. Some were also done in the early-60s. but the bulk seem to date from the 50s becuse they were very rapidly replaced by the CDV in the early-60s.
E.V. Grisen. The images we have noted all show black neckwear.>
Most American boys wire long pants in the 1850s. Younger boys from fashionable families apparently began wearing bloomer knickers with fancy suits at mid-century, but the photographic recird suggests this was not very common. Long pants after breeching were the dominant fashion. The photographic record is a good example of how common long pants still were in the 1850s. And given the cost of Daguerreotypes and even ambrotypes, long pants were probably even more common with thge general public than indicated by the photographic record. Slow speeds meant that subjects usually were phothraphed seated. And poses usually focused on the tirso. Itvis often difficult go make out the pants a boy was wearing or much in the way of detail. A good example is an unidentified boy, we think in the late-1850s. He is wearing button-on pants. We note boys wearing both solid/flat colored psnts, but patterns were also very common. Loud checks wre considered very stylish.
We have liitle information about 1850s hosiery. Most American boys wore long pants in the 1850s. Thus their hosiuery is covered up.
We also know very little about footwear. Most 1850s tin-types like the other eary formats (Dags and Anbros) were commonly poised with the subject or subjects sitting dowm beside a table. They usually photohraph the subjects from head down wiyh the feet croipped out of the image. Thus we do nnot hve a lot of images of footwear in the 1840s and 50s. This woulkd chnge with the appearance of DDVs in the 60s, but while we have suntantial 1840s and 50s archives, they offer rather limited infirmation on footwear.
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