Differing Responses to an Industrialising Economy - eTheses ...

Shoemakers or cordwainers occur in a few parishes throughout the study period,
but are not as numerous as further north. 117
Most did not trouble the probate courts, but
the probate inventory of one Bidford shoemaker lists in detail the contents of his shop. 118
The shoemaking Sale family was scattered throughout the Champion Country. John Sale
of Cleeve was grand enough to use the prerogative court, stipulating what should happen
to his real estate. 119
George Sale’s ‘trusty friend’, William Haines of Alcester, currier,
who was to help execute George’s will, may also have been the source of George’s
leather. 120
By Period D shoemakers were working in most parishes. Females in censuses
include a shoe-binder and a boot-closer, suggesting that womenfolk were employed to
sew the different parts together. 121
Only one male glover emerges from the records. 122
However, in Period D
censuses reveal several females employed as glovers, particularly in Bidford. Perhaps
one amongst them was an employer, or they may all have been outworkers for firms in
Alcester or Worcester. Maybe the gloves were cut out by one of the glove-machines
made in Bidford, then sewn together by the women. 123
Chandlers (or tallow chandlers) appear in Bidford and Welford. Some were
apparently less wealthy than their Alcester counterparts. 124
Nevertheless, chandlers were
117 Table 5.8 (1841 census) shows that 3.0% of adult males were shoemakers.
118 WoRO, probate of Thomas Harward, Bidford, cordwainer, 1725/6, £20-15-2. He used (sheep) skins for
his uppers and (cattle) hide for his soles. He also stocked wooden clogs and wooden heels, patten rings and
buckles, as well as tools and equipment for making shoes, boots and pattens.
119 TNA, PCC probate of John Sale, Cleeve Prior, cordwainer, 1748.
120 GlosRO, probate of Anthony Sale, Welford, cordwainer, 1752, £19. WoRO, probate of George Sale,
Bidford, cordwainer, 1773, (under £20).
121 WaRO, Bidford 1841 census for the shoebinder and Welford 1851 census for the bootcloser.
122 WoRO, marriage licence of William Baily, Cleeve Prior, glover, Jan. 1759.
123 See metal section for this zone concerning the glove-machine-maker. Some gloves made locally may
have been of other materials than leather.
124 For example, WoRO, probate of Henry Mould, Bidford, chandler, 1695, £18-17-10.
168