United States Boys' Clothes: Radcliffe Family (1861)
Figure 1.-- Here we have a cased Daguerreotype that comes with some information. A note inside the case reads "3 Children of Relief Simmonds Radcliffe: Adelaide - m. John Croft, Gertrude, Charles. The children look to be about 4-11 years old. They lived in Irving, Massachusetts. The note is not dated, but the metal frame is stamped: July 4 & 11, 1861". Charles wears the popular collar buttoning jacket with a bow rather than a stock. He also has a small white collar. His sisters wear matching low-necklne dresses with beaded necklaces. Charles' hair comes down to his ears. The girls have ringlets.
Here we have a cased Daguerreotype that comes with some information. A note inside the case reads "3 Children of Relief Simmonds Radcliffe: Adelaide - m. John Croft, Gertrude, Charles. The children look to be about 4-11 years old. They lived in Irving, Massachusetts. The note is not dated, but the metal frame is stamped: July 4 & 11, 1851". The year is indistinct, it could be 1851 or 1861. Dags were made in the eraly-1860s, but the great bulk of American Dags were made in the 1840s and 50s. We initially leaned toward 1851. We note, however, that these collar buttoning suits were still widely worn in the 1860s. The Lincoln boys, for example, wore them. Than we noticed the case. It had a patriotic Union, we mean Federal. (The name for these cases was also union cases because of thea mterial used. The process was created by heating the combination or the union of several materials that included fibrous material, wood fiber, gum shellac, gutta perca and color dye, thus the name Union Case. It was a kind of early thermoplastic. Union cases were produced about 1855-65. So the The date here must be 1861. But there is another indicator. There were 34 states in the Union (July 1861). It went up to to 35 states when West Virginia entered the Union (1863). And if you look at the protecive case, we see a patriotic motif with the United States shield. It has 'Union' at the top meaning Federal Union. And there are 34 stars--one for ervery state in the Union. So it uis aobvious that the oortait was taken in 1861. Charles wears the popular collar buttoning jacket with a bow rather than a stock. He also has a small white collar. His sisters wear matching low-necklne dresses with beaded necklaces . Charles' hair comes down to his ears. The girls have ringlets.
