The Boot and Shoe Trades in London and Paris in the Long Eighteenth Century

Table 3.1 - Gregory King's estimates for the consumption of footwear
Shoes
Men over 16 1,400,000
Boys under 16 1,200,000
Women over 16 1,500,000
Girls under 16 1,300,000
Total 5,400,000 100,000 5,300,000
Boots
Broags and Remainder Pairs Pairs
Population bare feet using footwear per year per year
Near one half of the men, or 600,000
10,000 1,390,000
30,000 1,170,000
20,000 1,480,000
40,000 1,260,000
Spatterdashes & Spring boots & Gambadoes
200,000
Shasoons & spur leather
500,000
Clogs & pattens
1/7 of the women and children 400,000
Shoes Exported
100,000
Total
2 2,780,000
2 2,340,000
2 2,960,000
2 2,520,000
- 10,600,000
1 pair in 6 years 100,000
1 pair in 4 years 50,000
1 pair in 5 years 100,000
2 per annum 800,000
100,000
11,640,000
Source: BL, Manuscripts Section, Han Mss 6867, f. 266. Published in N.B. Haste, 'The
Economics of clothing in the late seventeenth century', Textile History, XXII - 2 (1991), p. 284.
More than half a century later the situation was not much changed. In 1757
Joseph Massie calculated that "two pairs of shoes for each person upon average
may well be taken for the medium annual consumption of shoes".' 3 Well into the
nineteenth century, McCulloch reported that the total expenditure on shoes in
Britain reached £8 million a year. If the population at the time was 16 million,
the average per capital expenditure on shoes was half a pound a year, equal to
two pairs per person.' 4 Per capita consumption of shoes remained stable over the
13 j Massie, Consideration on the leather trades of Great Britain... (London, 1757), p. 18.
14 J.R. McCulloch, A dictionary, practical, theoretical and historical of commerce... (London,
1834), p. 702.
96