"Breeches Maker" in 1790-1797 Cambridge Directory

[Keith Sherwood]

Hi, Everyone,
Have for some time been trying to identify a John JOHNSON in the Cambridge area prior to the tailor's JOHNSON and Sons apparently being established in the town in 1802 (according to a newspaper report)
I've just come across two entries for individuals called John JOHNSON in a list of tradespersons for 1790-1797 in Cambridge;  one is a cooper, the other is a "breeches maker".
Would this latter man have possibly been on his way to becoming a tailor, and could I be looking now at the person I've been searching for.
Was there any kind of an apprenticeship for the making of breeches...?
Very best wishes,
keith

[Hackstaple]

Hi Keith

The suit as we know it did not exist. Breeches, waistcoats and coats were made by different artisans. I would imagine that the coat makers were more skilled. I would also think that both could be employed by a single establishment.

Breeches would also be common wear for the working man in summer but longer trews in winter. Those would have been of lesser quality and of cloth made to stand up to hard wear.

[Keith Sherwood]

Hi again, Hackstaple!
And thanks very much for that little summary.  Since I posted I've read that some breeches were made from moleskins.  I also seem to remember reading in churchwardens' accounts somewhere for the late 18thC/early 19thC that people who caught and killed moles (and sparrows) were paid a small bounty per (small) head.  There was probably quite a market for the moles, but I'm not sure about the poor sparrows, unless they were regarded as vermin, simply to be got rid of...
keith

[meles]

How interesting! My gg grandfather is decribed as a "tailor" in 1841 only 50 years on. When did the specialisms in various male garments get subsumed into one profession?

meles

[Gaie]

Hi Keith

This web-page has info on a Francis Place, b 1771, born in a debtors' prison, who progressed from leather breeches-maker to tailor in Charing Cross Road, London.  No mention of any apprenticeships, unfortunately.

http://www.bl.uk/collections/place.html

Kind regards
Gaie

[Gaie]

Same Francis Place, apparently he was apprenticed to a leather breeches-maker:

http://www.spartacus.schoolnet.co.uk/CHplace.htm

Gaie

[meles]

I wonder if Keith's ancestor worked with leather and moleskin, whilst  a tailor worked with cloth - the the difference in professions was not so much the garment made, so much as the material with which they worked?

meles

[Keith Sherwood]

Meles,
Did you mean that your ancestor too was described as "breeches maker" in about 1791...?  
And Gaie, thanks very much for unearthing all that information (like the look of the lady in the hat too!).
Yes, it's a whole area I know next to nothing about, but has been conveniently brought up, as ever, by a question or two arising from poking about in our own genealogies...
keith

[meles]

No, Keith - I have nothing on him from his birth in 1813 until I find him in 1842 as a fully fledged tailor. I'm sure he made uniforms for the Norfolk Militia.

His son was a "journeyman tailor" before he became a tailor.

meles