This week Hutchinson tells us from onboard the Buffalo of his adventures jumping overboard fully clothed to retrieve a beam. No sooner had he splashed into the sea he was alerted by those onboard that he had been joined by some sea animals with rather large fins. Luckily it turned out to be a pod of dolphins attracted to the barnacles and limpets attached to the beam. We can only imagine how sodden and wet Hutchinson’s clothes were when he eventually climbed back onboard. What kind of clothes would he have been wearing? How would he have washed and dried his clothes and did he have a change of dry clothes to change into? We’ll take a closer look at what people were wearing in 1836 and how fashion, gender, social class and textiles influenced the way people dressed.
