More Civil War Era Handwork

George Eastman House

A few weeks ago I posted pictures of women doing handwork about 1855-70. I've found a few more and I also found a source for similar early photographs.

The Ross J. Kelbaugh Collection includes several occupational photos of sewing women among the occupational photo he has collected.

See more photos by clicking on these links:
http://www.ssdaggers.com/HG/museum3.html
http://pinterest.com/source/ssdaggers.com/

19th-Century Repros From the Competition

If you are looking for inspiration for 19th-century reproductions check out this book: 

The Blue and the Gray: Quilt Patterns using Civil War Fabrics by Mary Etherington and Connie Tesene.

Mary and Connie are from Country Threads in Iowa, a great shop and a good source for reproduction fabrics.

Here are a few of their quilts.

On the theme of blue and gray they interpret quilts

right up to the end of the century

when grayed-blues and gray prints were so popular with quilters.

Civil War Era Handwork

Lecturer Sojourner Truth

sold various carte de visite (CDV) portrait photos

at her public appearances. Above she is pictured with yarn from her work bag.

Her work bag is on the right here.

She is often pictured with something in her

left hand (viewer's left) because an untreated accident

during her days in slavery

left that hand paralyzed.

Looking for something to do at a re-enactment?

Another knitter in a cased photo

from the George Eastman House collection.

Handwork is always good.

From the LadysResourceCDV blog.

She posts pictures of interesting CDV's.

http://ladysresourcecdv.blogspot.com/

I'm guessing at the date of the pictures by the clothing,

hair styles and photo format.

Crocheting ?

This is one of those naive charcoal portraits, based

on a photo, very often very unflattering.

Crocheting? Hemming?

Is that a quilt?

A tintype of a woman showing off her needlework tools

I showed this last week. Two women posed with a sewing box.

Most of these pictures are copied from

online auctions. Here's a crocheter in tintype that I

actually won. 

But don't think it was all handwork.

Perhaps an advertisement for a sewing machine?

Dixie Diary 9: The Hands of Strangers

Block 9 

The Hands of Strangers

8" Version

A 12" version with a 1" frame, set on point

By Sandi Brothers.

A nine patch split in the center symbolizes the break in the Morgan family's life as Sarah dwells on the loss of her home. In the fall of 1862 Sarah injured her back in a carriage accident and was unable to walk for months.

Mary Custis Lee

Collection: Virginia Historical Society

http://www.encyclopediavirginia.org/media_player?mets_filename=evm00002653mets.xml

Like Sarah, Mary Custis Lee used a wheeled chair, as they were often called at the time. The General's wife had rheumatoid arthritis.

Confined to a chair or bedridden and in pain, Sarah's New Year began with rumors that a Union officer was living in the Morgan's Baton Rouge house.

Union soldiers occupied fine southern houses from

the Lee Family's Arlington in Northern Virginia, shown here in 1864, 

down to New Orleans. Library of Congress.

January 4, 1863, Linwood, East Feliciana Parish

"Yankees do inhabit it, a Yankee colonel and his wife. They say they look strangely at home on our front gallery, pacing up and down. . . . And a stranger and a Yankee occupies our father's place at the table where he presided for thirty-one years. . . . 

Detail of painting showing an oil lamp

Rev. John Atwood and Family

by Henry F. Darby, 1845

Collection of the Museum of Fine Arts Boston

See more of the painting here:

http://www.mfa.org/collections/object/the-reverend-john-atwood-and-his-family-33727

"And the old lamp that lighted up so many eager, laughing faces around the dear old table night after night; that with its great beaming eye watched us one by one as we grew up and left our home; that witnessed every parting and every meeting; by which we sang, read, talked, danced, and made merry; the lamp that Hal asked for as soon as he beheld the glittering chandeliers of the new innovation, gas; the lamp that all agreed should go to me among other treasures, and be cased in glass to commemorate the old days, - our old lamp has passed into the hands of strangers who neither know nor care for its history. And mother's bed (which, with the table and father's little ebony stand, alone remained uninjured) belongs now to a Yankee woman!"

Women posed with their sewing and an oil lamp.

They seem to be adding decorative tape to a skirt,

a military look popular during the Civil War.

Sarah's old lamp was replaced by a gas chandelier before the War.

Cutting a 12" Block

A Cut 1 light and 1 dark square 6-7/8". 

 Cut each into 2 triangles with 1 cut. You need 1 light & 1 dark.

B Cut 4 medium rectangles 3-1/2" x 6-1/2".

C Cut 4 dark squares 3-1/2".

Cutting an 8" Block

A Cut 1 light and 1 dark square 4-7/8". 

Cut each into 2 triangles with 1 cut. You need 1 light & 1 dark.

B Cut 4 medium rectangles 2-1/2" x 4-1/2".

C Cut 4 dark squares 2-1/2".

Optional applique:

Applique a star or a heart after piecing.

Go back to the January 5, 2013 post to see a JPG with the heart and the star.

http://civilwarquilts.blogspot.com/2013/01/dixie-diary-1-her-flag-flying.html

Union troops occupying Baton Rouge's courthouse.

Dupre Library at the University of Louisiana

See more of this photo by clicking here:

http://duprelibrary.files.wordpress.com/2013/06/library_display_baton_rouge_courthouse_with_federal_troops_during_the_civil_war.jpg

Civil War Reproduction Album Quilt Pattern

The Sugar Camp Quilt

by Jennifer Chiaverini

Chiaverini writes novels with quilt themes and as she says on a web page that she likes to make a quilt like the one her character has made in the novel. This album quilt is one of her fictional creations.

It's a good interpretation of a period album quilt, a style and pattern that might have

been made during the Civil War. 

Jennifer and I have both written books

for C&T Publishing so she got my signature at a book signing event a few years ago.

Jennifer made the block---I signed it.

1864, Hazel Green, Wisconsin

I post occasionally about authentic quilts made during the War and this pattern comes up often.

Quilt made about 1865-66

in Saugerties, New York

http://civilwarquilts.blogspot.com/2013/06/a-lincoln-signature-quilt.html

1865, Orleans County, New York

Private Collection

GAR quilt 1867

from the Clara Barton Museum

BlockBase # 3266

Several variations of the pattern are indexed in my BlockBase program for PC's. This one was

published as Chimney Sweep by Ruth Finley in 1929.

The Shelburne Museum has an example they call Christian Cross.

The generic name would be Album pattern.

Quilters used several different arrangements of the pattern pieces to get the effect.

Here's the most common version from the Wisconsin quilt with

a free quilt pattern below:

Cutting a 12" Block

A - Cut 2 white squares 2-3/8". Cut each in half diagonally to make 2 triangles. You need 4.

B- Cut three white squares 4-1/4". Cut each into four triangles with 2 cuts. You need 12.

C- Cut 2 white and 8 print squares 2-5/8".

D -Cut 1 white and 4 print rectangles 2-5/8" x 6-7/8".

Sewing

I am pleased to be included in Jennifer's author/quiltmaker album quilt.

Here's Sue Grafton's signature from that quilt.

Read more about the Sugar Camp Quilt here:
http://elmcreek.net/gallery/quilts/authors-album-quilt

Below, some more mid-century versions of the pattern for color and print ideas.
The dates are on the blocks. Some may have been set together later. Many are from on-line auctions.

1848 Connecticut

1848 

1849

Wisconsin State Historical Society

1852 Harrison County, Ohio

1855 Collection of the Brooklyn Museum

1856 Gallatin, New York

A silk version dated 1867-68

from Mississippi

Personally, I think the blocks would look good in my new Civil War Jubilee prints.

97" x 97"

Sort of like this EQ7 sketch:

25 blocks finishing to 12",

Set on point with 3" sashing and cornerstones,

6" border.