Prefaces in Victorian knitting books

MA History dissertation finally finished. The submitted title was "Knitting as a leisure activity for early Victorian middle-class women 1837-1851". The research confirmed the initial peak of knitting book publishing was in the 1840s, with the exception of the 'Knitting Teachers Assistant' which seems to have first been published in 1817. The digitisation of books over the last 20 years, and the increase in catalogued archive contents has increased the availability of copies of knitting books from the nineteenth century. There were several books published that included reference to Queen Victoria and the Great Exhibition in their title. There seems to be a correlation with the most prolific and successful authors of knitting books also being being shop owners for wool warehouses that also teach knitting and crochet. I've found lots of interesting information about the author Frances Lambert, and found no evidence that Miss Frances Lambert is related in any way to Miss A Lambert. Now the dissertation is written and submitted I'm going to work through the notes to write a less-academic, more everyday-readable version of the interesting findings. Some I will submit to the Knitting and Crochet Guild newsletter, and others will appear here. What I certainly found is that the prefaces of Victorian knitting books contain a wealth of information about the authors and the social changes occurring at the time, and I would encourage their use for other researchers to ponder.

Here are a few prefaces that can be read online:

The ladies' knitting and netting book, 1838

https://archive.org/details/krl00376333/page/n5

The lady's assistant for executing useful and fancy designs in knitting, netting and crotchet work, Mrs Gaugain, 1840

https://archive.org/details/krl00394037/page/n3

My knitting book, Miss Lambert, 1844

https://archive.org/details/krl00394035/page/n5

The illuminated book of needlework: comprising knitting, netting, crochet and embroidery, Mrs Henry Owen, 1847

https://babel.hathitrust.org/cgi/pt?id=caia.ark:/13960/t5gb3726s&view=2up&seq=10

The workwoman's guide, containing instructions to the inexperienced in cutting out and completing those articles of wearing apparel, &c., which are usually made at home; also, explanation on upholstery, straw-platting, bonnet-making, knitting, &c., by a lady, 1838

https://babel.hathitrust.org/cgi/pt?id=uc1.c056087961&view=2up&seq=4

Cataloguing archive boxes containing fancy work and knitting patterns in the John Johnson Collection

There is an element of treasure-hunting the unknown when cataloguing archive boxes. As each box is laid down on the reading room table, there is an air of expectation of the treasure that may lay within. That you may be the first person to look in this box since it was neatly put away on a shelf in the archives many years ago.

I experienced this excitement cataloguing five boxes of archives in the John Johnson collection of printed ephemera held in the Bodleian library in Oxford. The collection absorbed the prior Constance Meade collection, and the boxes of fancy work and of knitting and crochet patterns were combined. A lack of funding, combined with the triviality often associated with knitting patterns ('trivial' was the word used by Potter in her bibliography), resulted in these five boxes not being catalogued up to now. As I have a research interest in the contents (studying a part-time MA in History), I took the decision to spend two days at the archive, rather than just one, so that I had the time to catalogue all the contents, and not just the contents relevant to my research. I'm currently in the process of reviewing and correcting my catalogue notes, and slowly submitting the details and photographers, box by box, to the collection, in the hope that they are of sufficient quality to be absorbed to the existing online catalogue, to aid future researchers.

As with any cataloguing process, there are surprising and unexpected finds, as well as disappointments. I had hoped to find a pre-1820 copy of the 'Knitting Teacher's Assistant', but that was not to be. However, I did find sheets of metal, a puzzle label, postage, and plenty of doodling and marginalia. Here are a couple of examples found in 'The knitting and crochet workbook', 2nd edition, published by Thomsons Brothers (year unknown).

There was also the satisfaction of reuniting a cover and title page located in box 6, that had been separated from the book contents in box 4. To clarify, I didn't do the reuniting myself. I followed the correct procedure and informed the Archivist on duty of my find in Box 6 that matched a book I had seen in Box 4 that was missing a cover, and it was the Archivist who did the actual re-uniting, and appropriate documentation.