Figure 1.-- This CDV portrait shows two children, surely siblings wear similar dresses and pinafores. The younger child is clearly airl. We are less sure about the older child. Girls sometumes had short hair, but not usually this short. Also it is unusual fir a little vgurl to have long hair and her older sister very short hair. Bur center paets often indicated a girl, so we are not entirely sure. The studio was S. Porter in Chippenham, Melksham & Calne. We are not sure about the dare, but believevit was the 1890s, partly because of the mount.

We are not enirely sure what clothes boys wore under pinnies. Pinafores were like smocks a protective garment worn over other clothes. We believe that they were usually worn over dresses by girls and unbreeched boys. That would mean mostly dresses and skirts. Wearing them over smocks would seem a bit of protective overkill, but this is not tp say it was never done. Some younger boys may have worn them over suits of some kind, but we cannot yet confirm this. We have not found any clear examples of this in the photographic record, although one of the boys on the previous page may be wearing a shirt amd pants of some sort. German boys wore a kind of play pinafore over short pants and other outfits, but we have not noted that in England. Our archive of pinafore images is still quite limited. And is not always easy to tell in available images, especoally as they are mostly black and white. Water colorist Helen Allingham outfitted her son in what looks like desses and pinafores during the 1880s. The pinafores are obvious, but it is not always clear what her son is wearing under the pinnies.

Created: 3:21 AM 9/22/2009
Last updated: 12:03 AM 10/5/2013