Another key difference between the accounts of Sarah Mellish and those of Dorothy Chambers is that Mellish’s expenditure was overwhelmingly dedicated to her own clothing, while Chambers frequently spent more money on clothing for other people in her family and household. She usually noted for whom a payment had been made, often using her children’s initials; ‘RC’ or Rosamond Chambers received a ‘cambric Muslin printed Gown’ in 1800, while ‘Mrs C’ herself had ‘3 shifts’ made in 1799. 59 A similar pattern of expenditure also emerges in the account book of the married Mrs Plumbe of Bradford. Mrs Plumbe had three children: Thomas, born in 1736; Frances or ‘Fanny’, born in 1741; and William, born in 1744. Little is known about Mrs Plumbe, and only a father’s name is listed on the baptism records of her children, but her son Thomas Plumbe would eventually go on to marry Elizabeth Tempest, thereby acquiring the manor of Tong Hall in Bradford in 1763. 60 Plumbe’s account book dates from 1761 to 1762, and her daughter Fanny Plumbe appears most often, presumably because at the age of twenty she was unmarried and still living in her parents’ household. Indeed, she was regularly given control of spending on the ‘house account’, perhaps in training for marriage. Mrs Plumbe noted various payments for all three of her children, for instance in August 1761 when she paid for ‘Stufe for taping fans petty Coat’ as well as ‘for making fans Gown. ’ In that same month she also ‘paid Mrs Norris for making my Gown 2s [and] body lining 1s 3d’, and other various purchases ‘for self’ were recorded over the course of the account book. 61
Although the children of both Dorothy Chambers and Mrs Plumbe were all over sixteen years of age, their mothers continued to pay for various items in their wardrobes. In the case of Rosamond Chambers and Fanny Plumbe, this was perhaps because they continued to live in the parental household, while William Plumbe was only seventeen when his mother’s account book began. Indeed, after 1764 Mrs Plumbe stopped making payments for Fanny’s clothing, suggesting that she may have moved out. 62 However, these mothers still purchased clothing for adult sons who no longer lived with them. In particular, both women made payments for their sons’ linen as they purchased fabric, and then paid to have it made up into shirts and other items. In 1800 Dorothy Chambers paid for ‘Makeing three Shirts for L. C. ’, and later that year paid £4 ‘for Irish cloth for W. C. C. Shirts’. 63 Mrs Plumbe similarly recorded paying ‘Mr Hollingshead for Cloth for my 2 Sons Shirts’ and for ‘making Wm P shirts’. 64 It was common for mothers to provide their sons with linen and, though these mothers did not stitch these shirts themselves, they assumed this responsibility by sourcing the fabric and overseeing the making-up. 65
Both Dorothy Chambers and Mrs Plumbe also purchased clothing for other members of the household beyond family. We saw in the previous chapter that women sometimes left bequests of clothing to female servants, who could also expect to receive clothing while their mistresses were alive. In 1799, Dorothy Chambers paid for ‘13½ yds Gingham for Gowns for Betty & Nanny’, two female servants in her employ, while in November 1761 Mrs Plumbe recorded paying for her servant Molly’s gown to be made. 66 Clothing male servants required a heftier investment. In 1802 Dorothy Chambers paid a male servant named John Hind £6 2s ‘for loss of clothes’, and in December of that same year spent £16 on ‘Man Servants Clothes for one Year’, a sizeable proportion of £62 1s 2d spent on clothing in total. 67 This mirrors the expenditure of Mary Leigh, traced by Stobart over her life cycle. Though she remained unmarried, Mary Leigh was unusual as she became responsible for managing the family estate in the 1780s. As a young woman, her expenditure was largely personal, but this was overtaken by other priorities when she became the head of a household. 68 Thereafter, her expenditure on clothing was dedicated largely to supplying servants rather than herself. 69 Though Sarah Mellish occasionally contributed to her servants’ wardrobes, she did not do so as regularly as Dorothy Chambers; in 1711, for example, she purchased ‘A pair of shues’ for her servant Peg Bradley, as well as purchasing another servant named Molly Shaw ‘A pair of stay for her self’. 70
Though Sarah Mellish was not responsible for clothing household dependents in the same way that married or widowed women were, she did not account for herself and her few servants alone. She also recorded expenditure on members of her family, and her own clothing appears across their accounts. In 1706, for example, Joan Mellish paid a Mrs Hargrate 1s 4d ‘for bringing Sarah Stayes’, and sometimes noted payments for washing her daughter’s clothing. 71 Often, these entries described items of clothing which do not appear in Sarah Mellish’s own accounts. In January 1709, for instance, Dorothy Mellish listed a number of payments ‘Laid out for my Sister Mellish’ which included the purchase of ‘a pare of Shamey gloves’, ‘a black Crape Fan’, ‘2 yards of plane Musling’, ‘32 yards of Noriedge Crape’, ‘14 yards of black Persion’, and ‘a Gray apron fringed’. Although Sarah Mellish noted in her own account book that she had ‘pd sister Mellish wt she Laid out for me at London’, and Dorothy Mellish similarly wrote that she had ‘Ended all accounts with my Sister Mellish at Blith 18: of August’, Sarah Mellish never described these items herself. 72 Money ‘laid out’ like this for family members was common practice in the Mellish accounts. Sarah Mellish laid out money for her ‘Sister Mellish’, ‘Sister Baker’, and ‘Sister Harvey’, as well as various cousins, while Joan Mellish kept an account in the back of her book of money disbursed on behalf of others, as well as a note of when these accounts were paid. 73 For instance, in April 1708 she wrote ‘Rec of my Daughter Harvey Money Disburs’d for her 15 yards stufe scots cloth stockings’. 74 The clothing of Joan Mellish’s granddaughter, Molly Harvey, also appears in both her father’s and her grandmother’s accounts. Indeed, it seems that Joan Mellish made purchases for Molly Harvey out of her own pocket, and it is likely that she was staying in her household at the time. 75 In 1706 Mellish paid Mrs Smyth ‘for Making Molly Harvey gown and petecot’, Nancy Parkinson for ‘making 4 shefts and Half for MH’, and also purchased a pair of gloves for her. 76