|
We note German boys in family portaits commonly wearing salilor suits with sailor hats and caps. . Younger boys might wear tunic suits in different styles. We note several different styles. Older boys wore different styles of sack suits. Norfolk suits were especially common. Kneepants and long stockings were very common. Younger boys commonly had close cropped hair. Girls commonly wore hair bows or tams and berets. Some even wore beretts with hair bows. White or light color dresses were popular, but we also see colored dresses. Gils also wore sailor dresses. Some had wide lace collars. Dark long stockings were common. Both boys and girls wore high-top shoes.
Here we do not have informtion on the entire family. We do know that there were four brothers. While we do not have information on the other members of the family, we have very extensive informtion on the brothers over an exteded period, 1892-1911. As we result we have decided to include them her in the family section. This 20-year period provide a wonderful look at boys' fashions at the turn of the 20th century. We at first thought the boys were Hungarian, but we have since learned that they were probably Austrian.
This photograph is undated, but would have been taken about 1900. We see a tenament in Hamburg with workers families. The boy have cropped hair and seem to mostly wear knee pants and long black stockings. One girl wears a black pinafore. The photograph is taken in the courtyard of a tenament. This destinguishes it from an American tenament which did not have courtyards like this and commonly had more floors. Notice the passageway here which seems to lead to another courtyard. Quite a number of photographs exist of immigrant tenaments in the United States. They are usually shown to depict the poor living conditions the immigrants endured. Of course usually not addressed is the conditions thaey had left behind in Europe. Thus the photograph here provides an interesting insight. Many American immigrants, however, had rural backgrounds.
This cabinet card portrait shows seven childrem five girls and two boys. They look likeva middle-class family in comfortable circumsrances. They are not identified, but the children look to be about 7-18 years of age. The younger boy wears a silor suit, his older brother a standrd suit. The girls all wear diffeent styles of dresses With a variety of patterns. They are a good view of popular styles in the 1900s. The only unifying factor is high collars. Several have collars that overlap their shoilders. The younger girl has one of these collars done in white with lace trim. The next younger girl has a dress that has sailor influnces, but we would not call it a sailor dress. The two oldest sisters weae dresses like young women. The oldest wear a blouse and skirt. The portrait is dated 1903. The mount is very similar 19th century cabinet card It is 4.25 x 6.5 inche, the stndard size. Iy is sine in a light grey, one of the new colors popular at the turn-of-the-20th century. The studio was Hermann Tietz.
This brother and sister are unidentified (figure 1). We do know that the portrait was taken in 1904 at Bonn. Some portraits suggest that the family members were not very close. This portait I think shows that the children were very close to eacj other. They may even be twins, probably about 4 years old. The boy wears an all white sailir suit with knicker pants. The girl is also dressed in white. She wears a white dress with a wide white collar.
We know nothing about this German family except that this photograph was taken in Berlin. I'm not sure when, but would guess about 1905. It's a little difficult to tell, but he seems to be wearing a fancy tunic and kneepants. The boy appears to have a hair style of two frizzy pony tails.
Here we see the Bordin family in the 1900s. The boy on the right (about 7 years old) is wearing an interesting striped sailor suit. The dicky under the middy blouse seems a bit unusual. All three of the children, girls and boys, wear the traditional black stockings and hightop shoes. The family seems prosperous. The father un particular is dressed very elegantly. I don't know any of the individual names--only the
family.
This photograph is undated, but we would guess about 1905-10. The family looks to be staying at a hotel resott in the mountains and are out for a walk. We are unsure who the adults are, probably the grandparents. I'm not sure who the second gentleman is. The boy wears a sailor suit. The girl wears a white dress with a tam. Note the flower in her hair. Thegirl and men have umbrellas. The boy has strings in his hand. I am not sure what the purpose was.
Here we have a portrait of the four children of a compfortable middle-class family. We unfortunately do not know their names. The two older children are bnoys and they wear identical kneepants sailir suits. The other children wear dresses, although we are not sure if the youngest child is a boy or girl. The portrait is undated, but was probably taken about 1905-10. They lived in Wilhelm Furetzky. The photographer was Lissa i./P. (in Posen) located at Bismarckstr. 5. The boys have very severe hair cuts, cropped about as closely as possible.
These German siblings were photogrphed in 1909 without their parents. We know nothing about their parents, not even the family name. They look like a substantial middle-class family. Their mother clearly liked sailor suits for both the boys and girls until they were older teens. We assume it was their mother, but perhaps father was also involved. It is a good example of how popular sailor suits were in Germany before World War I. The phtograph also illustrats the convention of dressing the children alike, in this case both the boys and girls wore sailor suits. Only the youngest child does not wear a sailor suit. He looks to be wearing a black dress. Two of the boys died in World War I.
Here we see Princess Daisy with her two oldest sons. It difficklt to sort out their nationality. Princess Daisy was born British and married a German, making her home in Germany. Hervhusband was a German aristocrat, but became Polish. Their two oldest sons fought with Polish and British forcesc during World War II. There were a lot of impoverished aristocrats in Britain during the Gilded Age. One sollution was to marry rich American debutantes. The American economy by the late-1870s was booming. Fortunes were being made. Edith Warton wrote about this in The Buccaneers set in the 1870s. One product of this was Winston Churchill. There were also impoverished female aristocrats. One impoverished female aristocrat, the vivacious Mary Theresa Olivia née Cornwallis-West (1873-1943), found a rich German--Hans Heinrich XV von Hochberg (1861-1938). He was a member of one of the wealthiest European noble families controlling large estates and coal mines in Silesia (now part of Poland). Notable witnesses at theur marriage were Edward, Prince of Wales (later King Edward VII) and his wife Princess Alexandra (1891). And through her husband she became aquainted with Emperor Wilhem II. She became known as Princess Daisy after her marriage and moved to Silesia (then part of the German Empire) where she lived in great luxury. A photograph of the Princess with her children appeared in an issue of the British magazine Country Life which commonly covered the social elite (1910). This may be the portrait (figure 1). She was known in German as the Fürstin von Pless. She becamne a social reformer and was a voice for peace. Unfortunztely Kaiser Wilhelm had other inclinations. During World War I she served as a nurse and her husband served in the German Army. After the War he rhusband became a Polish citiizens as his estates were in the new independent Polish state. She divorced him (1922). Princess Daisey after vthe War published none too discreet diaries. She was lived in gnteel povery during the NAZI era in German Silesia (1943) before the arrival of the Red Army. Her two oldest sons identified as British and Polish and fought the Germans in the British RAF and Anders Army.
Navigate the Boys' Historical Clothing Web Site:
[Return to the German 20th century family page]
[Return to the Main German family page]
[Introduction]
[Activities]
[Biographies]
[Chronology]
[Clothing styles]
[Countries]
[Bibliographies]
[Contributions]
[FAQs]
[Glossaries]
[Images]
[Registration]
[Tools]
[Boys' Clothing Home]
Navigate the Boys' Historical Clothing Belgin pages:
[Return to the Main German page]
[German choirs]
[German movies]
[German royals]
[German schools]
[German military schools]
[German youth groups]
