What did our ancestors look like? We know nothing about the appearances of most people who lived before the invention of photography. However, the parish records of Shotesham St Mary and St Botolph, held in the Norfolk Record Office, provide rare information about the sizes of some mid eighteenth-century people from this South Norfolk village. A contemporary transcript of the Shotesham overseers’ accounts for 1747-70 contains a list of clothing given to the poor. The overseers of the poor were the parish officers responsible for distributing poor relief.

As you would expect, the list records the recipients’ names, their parish of residence and the clothes that they were given. This was long before the days of ready-made clothing, so the list also names the tailor who made each garment and the quantity and types of fabric used. Unusually, however, the overseers of the poor also note the heights of most recipients, presumably to help gauge or justify the amounts of material used.

Richard Lovewell, who measured 5 feet 8¾ inches, received a coat made of kersey (a coarse woollen cloth). Brothers ‘Boy Hurn Biggest’, who was 4 feet 6 inches tall, and ‘Boy Hurn Smallest’ (3 feet 1½ inches) were both given twill frocks (smocks or long coats made from fabric woven with a diagonal rib pattern). Some of those on the list clearly received clothing because of a disability which prevented them from supporting themselves. ‘Blind Boy Spice’, who was five feet tall, had a ‘vestcoat’ (waistcoat) made from 1¾ yards of kersey. The unfortunate ‘Boy Neal Leg cut off’ received a frock made from 2½ yards of twill and a vestcoat of 1½ yards of kersey; his height, though, is not recorded.

The tallest recipient was Captain Harris, who, at 5 feet 10 inches, was about the same height as the average man today. Boy Yallop, the shortest beneficiary, measured just 2 feet 1 inch. Harris was presented with a kersey vestcoat, whilst Yallop received a twill frock and a kersey vestcoat.

Women, some of them widows, were recorded on a separate list. Their coats and gowns were made of different fabrics, such as flannel, cotton and camblet (a type of worsted or woollen cloth). Their heights ranged from Girl Lawn (4 feet 2½ inches) to ‘Kerridge’ (5 feet 6 inches).

Hannah Hall, a widow ‘Mrs Potters Heigth’, was allocated a gown requiring ‘7 yards and nearly ¾’ of fabric. Unfortunately for her, she was never to receive her new outfit. A marginal note states that ‘on hearing a bad Character of this Hannah Hall, being a bad sort of Bawd and to her own Daugh: this Gown was not sent, but a short one of less value was made’.

You can see this list of clothing recipients at the Norfolk Record Office on microfilm MF 941/4. The list is on folios 114-119 of the transcript of overseers’ accounts, which has the document reference PD 385/13.