Thomas K. Bullock

“ He was proprietor at the time of the Raleigh Tavern, Williamsburg’s largest and most famous hostelry.
When Gamble died, Edward Charlton, late from London, succeeded to the business and became in time Williamsburg’s leading barber and wigmaker. His livelihood—as perhaps he foresaw—was already doomed when he retired from business shortly before the Revolution: the wig fashion was on the way out in England and would soon be dropped in America. And in any case his former clientele would vanish from the streets of Williamsburg when the capital of Virginia was moved to Richmond in 1780. ”

“ In the latter century the first guilds of barbers were formed in both France and England, and by the seventeenth 5 century the golden age of the barber had begun.
For most of the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries in Europe an inordinate emphasis on appearance led to excesses of fashion in both costume and hairdress. Men followed the vagaries of high fashion as faithfully as women, and vied with each other in wearing long curls of their own or somebody else’s hair. ”

“ In such a small shop it seems unlikely that even a leading wigmaker could have had very many helpers. But Edward Charlton at one time had four apprentices and journeymen, and one of his contemporaries, Robert Lyon, in the space of two years had five known bond servants, at least three identified as barber-wigmakers.
Apprenticeship to a master barber and perukemaker was the normal—in fact the only—way for a boy to learn the trade. The Williamsburg wigmakers presumably all entered the craft in this manner, though Andrew Anderson is the only one about whom the record is clear. ”

“ He need not have been concerned on that score; the fashion throve better after the plague than before, attaining its greatest development under Queen Anne, when the long curls of men’s full-bottomed wigs covered the back and shoulders and floated down over the chest. ”

“ When the loaf is returned to the wig shop and broken open, the curls will have absorbed some moisture from the dough and must again be dried out in the charcoal oven. Finally dried and cooled, the curled hair can be taken off the pins and combed out in the hackle, further separated by lengths if necessary, and the root ends of each parcel trimmed off evenly. If the hair is thin and needs to be filled out with horsehair, or if hair of different colors is to be mixed to achieve a desired shade, this is the time to do it. ”

“ Clendinning’s prices were in the same range as those charged by Williamsburg wigmakers through most of the eighteenth century. It is worth remark that Charlton’s price for a brown dress bob wig was the same in 1770 as Andrew Anderson had charged in 1752 and as Jean Pasteur had received in 1726, though the earlier models were probably more elaborate than Charlton made.
From prices charged for various articles of clothing at the same period, it appears that a man could outfit himself with hat, coat, shirt, breeches, hose, and shoes for about what his wig would cost him. ”

“ A few of the Williamsburg barbers and perukemakers advertised their readiness to dress ladies’ hair, and Charlton regularly made “curls” for his customers’ wives. But most seem to have confined themselves wholly—or almost so—to barbering and bewigging male clients.
These clients were either town dwellers or members of the plantation gentry, who were the colony’s economic, political, and social elite. Of every hundred Virginians, eighty or more were small farmers or farm workers and did not own wigs. ”

“ By far the larger portion of hair used in Williamsburg-made wigs was imported from England, either by the perukemaker himself or by colonial hair merchants.
According to Diderot’s Encyclopedia, hair from regions such as Flanders, where beer and cider were the common beverages, made superior wigs; women’s hair was better than men’s; country women’s better than city women’s; and 11 chestnut was the most desirable color—except that white wigs should be made of hair that once had been black. ”

“ The trouble with hair is that it persists in growing, and every once in a while something must be done about it. Over the millenia since time began—or at least since people began—that “something” has been manifold in variety: dyeing, bleaching, oiling, powdering, pomading, trimming, curling, straightening, shaving off completely, or augmenting with hair from horses, cows, goats, and from other human heads. ”

“ The difficulties of debt collection were among the reasons why so many colonial Virginia craftsmen sought to augment their income by branching into some other activity. Williamsburg wigmakers favored innkeeping as their second occupation. No fewer than five operated ordinaries or provided lodgings, and one of them, Robert Lyon, moved on to become a merchant. David Cunningham served as the town constable for several years, and Alexander Finnie, of course, left the wig trade entirely to become host of the Raleigh Tavern. ”

“ Alexander Finnie gave notice in a 1745 issue of the Virginia Gazette that he was “in want of Two or Three 10 Journeymen, that understand the Business of a Barber and Peruke-maker,” and promised any who applied “good Encouragement.” The response to this ad was prompt, for the very next issue of the Gazette contained this notice by the master barber and wigmaker whose shop was directly across the street from Finnie’s:
Whereas my honest Neighhour, that has advertis’d for Two or Three Journeymen, has lately seduced One from my Service, in a clandestine and undermining Manner ”

“ William Peake—A Yorktown barber, wigmaker, and dealer in imported wigmaking supplies who made a brief appearance in Williamsburg, first opening shop in the tavern of William Dunn, then buying the old shop of Andrew Anderson and taking into partnership James Currie. Currie seems to have run the Williamsburg end of the combine while Peake returned to Yorktown.
Edward Perry—The Guardian Accounts of York County show that he was paid for shaving and a wig in 1748. Nothing more is known of his barbering or wigmaking activity. ”

“ WIG SHOPS IN WILLIAMSBURG
The shop that Richard Gamble entrusted to his new partner in 1752 stood next door to the Raleigh Tavern, in what was sometimes called “the most public part of the city.” Certainly no better location in Williamsburg could have been found for a barber shop than on the Duke of Gloucester Street in the block nearest the Capitol. ”

“ George Lafong, whose Williamsburg wig shop rivaled Charlton’s in the early 1770s, ended as a beggar in 29 1796. Someone, it seems, must pay the price for every forward step in the march of progress. Were it not so, all of us might still be wearing wigs today.
THE BARBERS AND WIGMAKERS OF WILLIAMSBURG Andrew Anderson—Apprenticed for seven years to John Peter Wagnon of Williamsburg in 1731. After only five years became his own master and bought Wagnon’s shop next to the Raleigh Tavern. The only Williamsburg barber known to have practiced dentistry and phlebotomy. ”

“ Furthermore, avowed the same authority, “In general the hair of persons not given to excesses lasts a long time, while that of men who live in sexual debauchery, or of women who give themselves to the uses of men, has less sap, dries out, and loses its quality.” ”

“ Anglican clerics in Virginia, as Charlton’s accounts testify, wore brown dress bobs just like those of so many of their parishioners.
THE MAKING OF A WIG
The eighteenth-century wig was built up of rows of hair woven at the root ends to cross-threads, each row being then sewn to a net-and-ribbon skullcap or “caul.” The steps in making a queue wig would differ, of course, in some detail from those in making a wig without a queue. ”

“ The tradition of the humble artisan whose industry and integrity earned him the esteem of his fellow citizens ran strong in colonial America. Unfortunately for the wigmakers, however, no bulwark could withstand the ebb tide of fashion. ”

“ All of these Williamsburg barbers and perukemakers performed at least one, but not always all three, of the craft’s 4 basic services: (1) making, selling, and dressing wigs and false hair pieces for men and women; (2) cutting and dressing men’s, women’s, and children’s natural hair; and (3) shaving men. ”

“ George Lafong—Kept shop in Williamsburg from 1762 to 1783, at one time selling a pair of curls to Patsy Custis, Washington’s stepdaughter. Advertised on several occasions for a journeyman to help him, and in 1777 took Alexander Wiley into partnership. Nineteen years later Lafong turned up as a beggar on the streets of Norfolk.
Walter Lennox—First appeared in Williamsburg court records in 1759. From 1768 had his shop at the Sign of the Red Lion, where he also offered lodgings. His frequent advertisements for a journeyman indicate that he did a lively business. ”

“ He is in want of a quantity of human hair, both long and short, of any colour, for which he will give one shilling per ounce, or more, according to the quality. Apply to Mr. James Nichols, barber in Williamsburg, who will receive it and pay the money, or to me in Petersburg. ”

“ That the Gentlemen forward their Orders to himself, or to any of their Friends in Glasgow, expressing the Colour, Fashion of the Wigs, and Dimensions of the Caul, and the Price about which they would have the Wigs made up. ”

“ Presumably, too, most of them had apprentices in turn; but here the surviving information is quite skimpy.
Journeymen (craftsmen who had finished their apprentice training but had not yet gone into business as their own masters) were in good demand and apparently in good supply. ”