18th Century Wallets
A Pocket Dictionary (1758) defines a wallet as “A travelling bag, with the mouth or entrance in the middle, to carry goods in each end.”
The related French term besace is translated and defined in The Royal Dictionary (1728):
Wallets can be sewn from heavyweight linen or hemp using a fairly simple pattern. In the 18th century, these sacks were used for carrying bundles of goods, as recorded in trial proceedings from Georgian England and newspaper advertisements from colonial America.
Another page focuses on wallets and shoulder-sacks in the 13th-16th centuries. This detail from The Thames at Richmond (early 17th century) shows a woman carrying a similar bag over her forearm.
Additional Resources
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18th Century Material Culture: Bags, Sacks, & Wallets
Blogs about market wallets: HM 40th Foot, Tiger Lily’s Threads, A Woodsrunner’s Diary, Much Given to Liquor
Françoise Duparc, L’homme à la besace; BA 405, Marseilles, Musée des Beaux-Arts
Monſr Vulture, 1737-1742 (may be more of a conventional sack)
A beggar with a staff and wallet drawn by Paul Sandby in 1746 after an illustration in Abraham Blomaert’s drawing book
London Cries: Man with a bundle, Old Clothes by Paul Sandby
Mop sellers by Paul Sandby, 1759
Raggs or old Cloaths from the Cries of Dublin, 1760
The Female Bruisers by John Collet, 1768 (may be a conventional sack, though)
L’homme à la besace by Françoise Duparc, 1778
A male street trader by Thomas Bewick, 1780 (may just be a conventional sack)
Inhabitants of Västergötland by C.W. Swedman, c. 1780-1840
An Engagement in Billingsgate Channel, between the Terrible and the Tiger, two First Rates, 1781
A Mendicant, 1790
Le Villageois by Louis-Marin Bonnet
Cries of London: Buy a Trap, a Rat Trap by Thomas Rowlandson, 1799
The Schwenkfelder Library & Heritage Center has a pair of market wallets made by Lydia Schultz in 1841 – 1926.03.01 and 2006.14.01. Both are made from bleached plainwave linen with embroidery in red silk.
What’s In Your Wallet: London Edition
18th century wallets and their contents from the Proceedings of the Old Bailey
February 27, 1712: “They were a second time indicted for stealing 2 Geese, value 2 s. and one Gander, value 2 s. 6 d. the Goods of Dorothy Gibb, at the same time and place. Both the Prosecutors swore to the Loss of their Goods; and the Prisoners being stopt by St. Giles’s Watch, they were found upon’em in a Wallet. They had little to say, but that the Goods were dead when they found ’em.”
February 4, 1722: “The Constable deposed, that when he was searched, they found a large Wallet about him, with a Tinder Box, Flint, Steel, Matches, a Gimblet, Knife and Pick-lock-key: all which were produced in Court. The prisoner in his defence said, he carried the Wallet to put Carrots in, which he was then sent to buy, but being pursued by the Bailiffs, he jumpt over the Wall to hide himself.”
October 11, 1732: “What was in your Wallet when the Women took it away?” “I had a large Parcel of Stockings, I can’t remember how many Pair; but I can be positive to 7 Pair of fine Hose in particular, which stood me in 4 s. 6 d. a Pair prime cost.”
May 7, 1742: “When we came to look in the Wallet for the forty Shillings, we were extreamly surprized and disappointed, to find nothing in them but a Piece of brown Bread, and a Piece of Cheese.”
July 3, 1751: “He had got a wallet on his shoulder, I ask’d him what he had got in it, he said, victuals. Then Mr. Morgan call’d out of a window, and ask’d, what was the matter. He said, I had stop’d him. I said, I thought he had things about him that did not belong to him: then I took him back to the Bull and Gate, saying, if you are clear I will call for a pot of beer. When we came there he said, don’t make a noise, I have got three ducks in my wallet, and I am a poor man. Then I took him to the constable, and heard Mrs. Bury describe them before we took them out of the wallet.”
May 26, 1757: “We opened the wallet, in which we found a pair of stone buttons, a cap and a shirt.”
May 30, 1759: “The prisoner work’d in my house, for fifteen or sixteen months, for Mr Wilberham, he had a wallet hung up behind his loom. My husband in looking for a buckle that was missing, he came to me and said, he saw five bobbins in the wallet. I went to make this man’s bed, I felt in the wallet, and found it of a great weight, I took out one bobbin. On the next day, my son, the prisoner, and others, went out in the evening; then I bolted the street-door, and went and took down this wallet, and in a napkin were twenty bobbins of silk, some white, some orange, and some pale yellow. I compared the mark of the bobbins, with that mark of those that hung upon his work. After that, I let it pass on ’till the twenty-fifth of February, then my husband and I were alone; I put my hand in the wallet, and found two bobbins that came between the Monday and Thursday.”
February 19, 1772: “There was about 300 l. worth of lace sent up in three wooden boxes … the boxes were in the wallet.”
What’s In Your Wallet: American Edition
18th century wallets and their contents from American newspapers
Wallets, Pillowcases and Bags: Accounts during and closely associated with the era of the American Revolution, 1775-1782 also has a thorough collection of descriptions of what wallets were used to carry.
“He had with him a Sett of Shoemakers Tools in a Wallet made of an old Sack Bagg” (Virginia Gazette, July 14, 1738)
“a broken Linnen Wallet, with a Surveyor’s Compaſs and Chain, the ſaid Chain was in a ſmall Linnen Bag, and the Compaſs, Socket and Sight, were in little Bags of light colour’d Duffil, together with a Braſs Scale one Foot long, and a Shagreen Caſe of drawing Inſtruments, both in the like Sort of Duffil, and a Protractor of Braſs, in a Leather Caſe, with a ſmall wooden Square.” (Virginia Gazette, June 27, 1745)
“he alſo carried with him, in a brown Linen Wallet, two check Shirts, a pair of check Trowſers, an old Drugget Coat, with Cuffs to the Sleeves, very much patch'd before, a blue German Serge Waiſtcoat, a pair of old German Serge Breeches, of a dark Colour, lined with blue Shalloon, two Pair of Mens Stockings, and a Pair of Womens Stockings” (Virginia Gazette, October 3, 1745)
“They took with them a blue Barragan Curtain made into a Wallet.” (Maryland Gazette, July 7, 1747)
“a wallet, of tow linen, which was tied behind the ſaddle, in one end of which was another wallet of ozenbrigs, and at the other end a bundle tied up in a blue duke pattern handkerchief, containing a new fine white ſhirt, and two pocket-books” (Pennsylvania Gazette, March 19, 1751)
Items found in a tavern that may have been stolen (Pennsylvania Gazette, December 10, 1751), including:
“A Linnen Wallet, containing four ſpeckled Shirts, an Ozenbrigs Shirt, wrapped in a Handkerchief; a ſmall painted Box, containing ſundry Ribbons, &c. a Remnant of Poplin, and three Remnants of Tammy, two Shifts, two Aprons, a white Jacket, and a Bundle of Shreds.”
“A large Wallet, containing three new Linnen Shifts, half made, with Thread, Cambrick, &c. to finiſh them; one old ruffled Shift; two Remnants of blue Callicoe … four Womens Caps, three Linnen, and one Silk Handkerchiefs, put up in a red Pocket, two Gowns, two Caps, an old Shift, wrapped in a Linnen ſpeckled Handkerchief.”
“In another Wallet (which was in the above large Wallet) ſix new Holland Shirts, four long Neckcloths, four Mens Caps, tied up in a Handkerchief, an old Check Shirt, bloody at the Wriſts, Boſom and Sides, and a Linnen Shirt alſo bloody, two pair of Trowſers, one of Ticken, the other Check, a Fuſtian Jacket, one Cap, four Pair of Stockings, a Man's Frock, of corded Poplin, lined with blue, an old Petticoat and Hat, a Check Safeguard, tied in a flower’d Linnen Handkerchief, a pair of old Stays, three Gowns, one of them Linnen, one Calimanco, and the other Chintz, put up in an old Check Apron.”
“a little wallet, the one end plain cloth, and the other twilled, with the letter D on the twilled end” (Pennsylvania Gazette, May 7, 1752)
“He took with him a narrow ſtriped ticken wallet” (Pennsylvania Gazette, April 26, 1753)
“linen wallet, with a linen ſhirt and a pair of black ſtockings therein.” (Virginia Gazette, November 12, 1767)
“he had a wallet, containing a pair of old blue cloth breeches, with white buttons, and much patched, a light coloured camblet coat, with black ſhalloon lining, black buttons and binding.” (Virginia Gazette, August 8, 1771)
“he likewiſe took with him two new Check Shirts, and a Pair of new Oſnaburg Trouſers, which he carried in a Virginia Cloth Wallet, marked S M.” (Virginia Gazette, June 16, 1774)
“an oznabrig wallet marked with copperas cotton W A.” (Virginia Gazette, December 22, 1774)
“linen wallet, with two ſhirts and a pair of ſtockings” (Virginia Gazette, November 13, 1778)
“a wallet, with two pair of ſtockings, one pair lately waſhed and not dry” (Pennsylvania Gazette, April 19, 1786)
“a large wallet made of Oznaburgs in it was a ſmall Trunk, and in the Trunk 2 or 3 pen knifes a spring lance and thumb lancets, ſeveral phials & papers with Medicines, there was alſo in the wallet many papers and phials with Medicines, a a caſe made of cloth with a ſilver probe Sciſſars and other different kind of Doctor’s inſtruments” (Newbern Gazette, March 20, 1800)