SHOE

A 19th century leather boot, incomplete and now partly covered in lichen. The boot was found unburied in woodland. June Swann comments from photographs: This is a hob-nailed ankle boot for work, or possibly army, use. It has two rows of brass rivets at the waist, and 10/11 pairs of lace holes. Most of the iron seems to be missing and the photographs are not clear enough to say if the forepart sole was iron rivetted, though that is likely. The forepart sole edge has broken away at the line of rivets and hobnails, which would have gone around the edge, with three rows of hobs in the middle. There were also hobs around the edge of the stacked leather heel. Rivetting was revived with the 1853 Leicester patent and quickly became common and cheap work wear with machine-sewn uppers about 1860. On the upper are two rows of stitch holes attaching the boot leg to the vamp, with extra strong stitch, or possibly rivet at the corner. I cannot see the stitch holes across the throat so if the lace hole sections are open at the bottom ('open tab' for extra adjustment) that would be usual for a work boot, though Northampton Museum has one 1861 work boot stitched straight across (closed tab). The boot may have been too small for the wearer who has worn the leather away right across the toe - or it may have torn away with the rusting iron. If I am estimating the date correctly the toe was originally square. The leg is comparatively high cut, which places it c1860. If there is no back seam to the leg it is a Blucher, which does not fit as well as a back-seamed boot. As you can imagine tough boots of this type have not commonly survived, until the indestructible lower cut ankle boots of the 1890s-World War One period which were mostly made in the Kingswood area of Bristol.