Chats on Household Curios

by Fred. W. Burgess

FIG. 72.—OLD SPINNING WHEEL.
(In the collection of Mr. Phillips, of the Manor House, Hitchin.)

To secure a fine spinning wheel is the ambition of collectors, and many ladies point with pride to the old relic placed in a position of honour on an oak chest of drawers, or, perhaps, standing on a coffer in the hall. An exceptionally fine wheel is shown in Fig. [72]; it is one of many secured by Mr. Phillips, of the Manor House, Hitchin. Another illustration is taken from a sketch of a spinning wheel in the Hull Museum (see Fig. [73]). It appears that early in the nineteenth century Hull encouraged the training of domestic spinners, and at that time supported a spinning school. Apropos of that institution reference may appropriately be made to Hadley's "History of Hull," in which the historian, in reference to Sunday Schools, which had then quite recently been founded, says: "From the Sunday School reports for this year [1788] it seems they did not take. To whatever cause this may be attributed, it by no means warrants the aspersions thrown upon the town on that account, which has with equal ardour and wisdom espoused that useful establishment of Spinning Schools, in preference to a preposterous institution replete with folly, intolerance, fanaticism, and mischief." In explanation it has been remarked that, "Evidently wheels were plentiful in Hull and Sunday Schools a novelty." To-day we can reverse the statement, for schools are plentiful but spinning wheels are rare!

Collectors eagerly secure anything in the way of a genuine antique wheel, although the fastidious have the choice of two distinct types—those worked by hand and those operated by a treadle. Sometimes a spinning wheel made for the foot could be worked independently by the hand, just in the same way as modern sewing machines are made for hand or treadle, and sometimes a combination of both methods. The very general use of the spinning wheel is accounted for by the fact that this useful machine was met with in every cottage in the days when homespun yarns and wools were prepared by hand, and they were also found in the mansion and the palace, where they served to amuse the ladies of the household.

There are many varieties of spinning wheels, among them the old oak spinning wheels used in England in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, and the more decorative used until quite late in the eighteenth century, from their ornament and lightness, apparently used more for preparing the material for fancy work rather than for really utilitarian purposes. Some highly decorative spinning wheels inlaid with mother-o'-pearl and ivory have been brought over to this country from Holland and other continental countries, perhaps the most decorative being those made by French workmen in the Chinese style, the wood being lacquered blue and ornamented with gilt.

Mr. John Suddaby, who presented the spinning wheel we have illustrated to the Hull Wilberforce Museum, named after William Wilberforce, paid a high tribute to the famous philanthropist, who he declared to be associated with the spinning schools of the town. The old wheels of early date were gradually improved until they were rendered obsolete by the greater inventions of machines which could be worked by steam engines, thus originating the factory system of textile production.

Among the sundry curios associated with the spinning wheel are handsomely carved wood distaffs of boxwood, curiously turned spindles; and now and then a pewter vessel of circular form, puzzling in its identity, turns out to be the rim cup from the distaff of an old spinning wheel.

Materials and Work.

Old workboxes appear to be very numerous. The older ones were mostly of wood, but the external decoration seems to have been a matter of taste, some preferring inlays. In early days moulded plaster ornament, richly gilded and coloured, was much favoured, and in still earlier times deep relief carvings in the oak of which the boxes were made. In the Stuart and later periods ladies worked the exterior ornament in silks and satins and embroidery. Among the workboxes in the Victoria and Albert Museum there is a painted box in distemper and gilding, the subject chosen for the ornamentation of the lid being the story of David and Bathsheba, round the sides being floral devices. This decorative workbox has drawers and compartments, a sliding front facilitating their use.

In the same collection there are workboxes overlaid with straw work in geometrical patterns relieved by colour. Straw-work decoration was much favoured at the commencement of the nineteenth century, its origin being traceable to the French military prisoners in this country during the Napoleonic wars between the years 1797 and 1814, when many officers and men were detained at Porchester Castle, near Portsmouth, and at Norman Cross, near Peterborough. The grasses, of which the boxes were covered, were collected and dried by the prisoners, who obtained the different shades and tints which render this class of work so effective by steeping them in infusions of tea, according to a note by Dr. Strong, who visited the barracks at Norman Cross.