I am a history major. However, I don’t care at all about wars or dates. I couldn’t care any less about the years that each English monarch was in power. I have never had any interest in any political actions of any rulers that died before 1900. What I’m interested in is Gossip, and there is so much of it. It’s juicy too, so who am I if not one to share it with the world? For now, you can consider me your historical Gossip Girl!
After spending my senior year interning at Colonial Williamsburg, not only did I learn how to sew petticoats and the ways that women of the past dressed, I learned a plethora of stories of the people who lived and worked in what was a rather small city. Today, I ask that you suspend your disbelief for a few minutes as I take us back to the late 1700s in the founding of the U.S for three of what I consider to be the most interesting stories of the people of the time.
Washington’s too short shirts
Our country’s first president is known for spo many great things. Crossing the Delaware in the middle of winter. Leading the colonies to independence. Setting the example for what a president will be…What he is not known for is the fact that he had unusually long arms. This man was built like an orangutan, with little help from the fact that he was both 6 foot 2 and a redhead. (Never wore a white wig a day in his life but that’s another story) George was also known in his time for being incredibly clean and modest. He would have been overkill even in today’s world with running water and easily available showers.
In the time, a man’s “shirt” meant the under most layer underneath a suit. Of these, George owned 56, way more than expected. Also, he was an aristocrat so all his shirts were imported from tailor’s in England. Here is where you ask, “Where’s the gossip? This is so boring” and I say “I’m getting to it!” So George gets his measurements from a tailor over in the colonies and sends it off to his tailor in England. The tailor looks at the length of the arms on the tapes got delivered and says “no no no. There is no way that these exist on a person. We’ll make them a normal length! You’re welcome, General Washington.” So George gets his shirts back and now there exists a very angry letter from the United States’ first president to his English tailors because they saw his freakish arm measurements and decided for themselves that they could not possibly have been real.
Patrick Henry’s Garbage wardrobe
”Give me liberty, or give me death!” Cries out Patrick Henry in 1775 to the second continental congress. For years before that, though, it was “Patrick, buy a new suit! The ones you have are disgusting!” from the Virginia House of Burgesses (I can only assume, but of course I was not there). Patrick Henry, a member of the House of Burgesses, a part of the gentry class in the colonies, a rather wealthy man despite his immigrant father, owned two suits. We don’t necessarily have a perfect understanding of how much clothing the “average” person had in that time but what we do know is that Patrick Henry should have had more, or at the very least keep them in better condition. They were in tatters every meeting and the rest of the House of Burgesses had to consistently beg him to get new ones because they all thought he was making them look bad. Patrick was also a wig-wearer (Not nearly as shameful in his time as a false head of hair today) and when he ran for governor, his opponent asked the state how they could ever trust a man whose wig was “caul bare.” Patrick, who had kept up the effort of a bald head underneath the wig couldn’t be bothered in the least to take it to his wig-maker and handle the upkeep.
One day, our Patrick finally gives in and says “Fine! I’ll buy a new suit! I’ll do what you want!” He heads down to his tailor and gets himself made this nice salmon color suit. Later, he writes in his journal that he was able to “walk down the street unmolested” because nobody knew it was him. Not only was he thinking so highly of himself that he was sure people would be clamoring to talk about his new suit, but nobody knew it was him because for once in his life, Patrick Henry put effort into his appearance.
The Billy Russell Affair
This one is my personal favorite! I’ll start with our key players here. Jane Hunter is a milliner in Williamsburg with two sisters, Margaret (who also lives in Williamsburg) and Elizabeth (who still lives back in England). Elizabeth sends her daughter, creatively named “Elizabeth, whom we will call Betsy, to the colonies to live with her aunts and perhaps be an apprentice to Aunt Margaret. She grows up and marries the boy, literally right next door. The undersheriff of the town. William Russell. They have two daughters, who of course are very close with Great Aunt Jane, and everything is just a perfect domestic life. Until…
Years later, Betsy has passed and so has aunt Margaret. Jane moved into Margarets old shop and remained close with those two girls from before, but her life was long lived and it was time to write her will. Her husband is dead so the only family she has is those two girls. She gives everything to her nieces. The shop. All of her money. Everything she owns. All to them with a single stipulation. William Russell is not allowed to see a single cent of it. Now, we don’t have a ton of records regarding the Hunter family and the Russell’s relations, but remember our Betsy? After she died, William married the local tavern owner much sooner than anybody would have expected! Barely a period of mourning for his wife.
Here’s where we get into my personal conjecture. I have zero evidence for this but I believe that Billy Russell was having an affair with the tavern owner from before while Betsy still lived. Even more so, I think Jane knew about it and that’s why he wasn’t allowed to see a cent of her wealth, of which she had been doing alright for herself. Not an aristocrat by any means, but perhaps if the boy next door hadn’t done whatever he did to tick her off, he’d have been able to use it to get just a little more ahead in life.
While all of these may have been embellished, just a little, that’s history for you. Besides, what is gossip if not a game of telephone? So what if it’s a few centuries later that the phone gets passed along.