Journey to Judge: Researching Ona Judge Part III

For this section, I decided to focus my attention on the wardrobe. What would have Ona Judge worn in 1796? 

Now, here's the thing that left me a bit perplexed. According to the runaway ad, it described Ona had taken several nice dresses with her, but were too many for the Washingtons to recollect. Since Ona Judge was Martha Washington's personal lady's maid, this meant that she would have worn the nicest clothing compared to what a domestic maid or a field hand would have worn. So...this lead me to the age old question...what should I wear? Which style dress would best interpret Ona's occupation? 

Looking up examples of 1790's fashion plates online and in my Kyoto Fashions book, this simple and yet elegant gown grabbed my attention and made me feel like this would be a good fit. The only thing I am not 100% sure of is whether Ona would have owned any taffeta gowns; If anything cotton or linen fabrics would have been selected for her in either a plain or chintz or calico print. 

   

As a result I decided on the KISS method (Keep It Simple Silly), and just use what I already had available. I had 1 1/2 yard of leftover avocado green linen from the pierrot jacket I made last month and ordered another 2 yards for the skirt of the dress. Since this was to be a late 1790's dress, I picked the 1809 Regency Pattern by Period Impressions. Believe it or not, there really isn't much of a difference in a basic 1790's dress and an early Regency gown so imagine how relieved I was with how easy this would be. On a similar note, I also used this pattern previously for the 1812 full mourning gown and the blue 1819 gown that was made for the Sally Hemings program I performed back in 2016, so I figured that going this route would be like a walk in the park.

1809 Dress Pattern from Period Impressions 

After I got the basic structure of the dress down, I immediately noticed a problem with the sleeves: the upper halves of the sleeves turned out to be way too big. I figured this was because of the way the pattern was originally drafted out. So I had to make some augmentations by trimming the tops down some and not using the armband, I also turned the hem up as well so it would be at least wrist length; the result worked out pretty well.

I also added a 1/2 inch waistband to the dress, mostly because I needed the remaining fabric for the skirt. As a side note, I highly recommend doing basting stitches along the bottom of the bodice before adding the waistband. This is to make absolutely certain that everything stays together so you're not like me trying to tug down the lining and the outer fabric so everything would be even, WHILE sewing the band on. Less headache for you to deal with, folks!

Instead of using the sewing machine to sew the skirt onto the waistband, I hand-stitched it with very tiny running stitches (mostly because I ran out of the green thread and only had white available and didn't want it to show up on the dress).

Another thing I thought about was whether or not to accessorize. I wasn't able to find information about jewelry in the runaway ad, and Erica Dunbar's book "Never Caught" really didn't specify if Ona had accessories, and if so, I may have overlooked it. Dunbar however did mention that George Washington did supply Ona and the other six slaves that lived and worked in the Executive Mansion a supply of clothes and shoes, and at times were gifted an allowance of $1. It's probable that Ona may have used that $1 to buy herself a pair of earrings. I utilized that piece of information and went on and purchased a pair of garnet raspberry earrings from The Lady Detalle. However, I wanted to be 100% sure that these would work.

With that being said, I sought advice and research assistance from these wonderful<3<3<3 ladies from Mount Vernon: Brenda P. who portrays Caroline, Elizabeth H. who portrays the young Martha Washington, and Mary Thompson who is the resident research historian. With their help, they were able to answer my questions pertaining to the earrings: While garnet jewelry was Martha Washington's favorite pieces of jewelry to have (there's a collection of a garnet necklace  that  is documented); she actually provided silver ball earrings to her enslaved maids in 1760's (maybe in the 90's too?) ; the raspberry earrings were still good to use considering the the several changes of fine clothes Judge had that the Washington's did not include in the runaway ad, and because of the money Ona had on her person even around the time of her escape on May 1796.

Again, I want to thank Brenda, Elizabeth, and Mary for all of their help, in guiding me into a different direction of how to best tell Ona's story.

Got more research to do, but I'll fill you in on Part IV.