Mary Knapton
Occupation: Mantua and Sacque maker, admitted to the Company in February 1753.
Researcher Katy Leverett 2024
Background:
Mary Knapton was baptised Mary Merry at St Crux on 14th December, 1725. Her father was Samuel Merry, a weaver. Her mother was likely Mary Merry, a Merchant Taylor who had been abled as a master tailor on 18th October 1715. Mary Merry had several apprentices, including Elizabeth Varly in 1724, Rebecca Powell in 1730 and Jane Leak in 1750.
There is no record of Mary’s apprenticeship. She likely learned her trade growing up in a family heavily involved in the York textile trade. It is unknown whether her mother was a mantua maker or not, though this is the profession Mary herself would take. Note: Like Mary sent her daughter Jenny to London, maybe Mary was sent to London by her mother? Obviously cannot substantiate this but a possible theory.
This is the sort of dress Mary may have produced, from Janet Arnold’s Patterns of Fashion.
Mantua dresss, c1770, Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York
Here is some further information about her timeline and life use the QR code here
Legacy:
Mary and Philip had two surviving children: Samuel and Jenny/Jane. Samuel was baptised in 1756, whilst little is known of Jenny’s early life. Samuel went on to become a peruke maker and was made free of the city in 1777. According to an edition of the York Courant dated 8th May 1787, Jenny entered into the mantua trade in business with her mother, having trained in London, the extract reads:
York Courant, 8th Mary 1787. Advertisement for Mary Knapton’s services.
It is unclear when Philip himself died. He was taking apprentices until 1780, though Mary refers to herself as a widow in her will signed in 1798. In her will, Mary named her son Samuel as executor and left most of her possessions to him, including £110, “my two handled silver cups and two silver table spoons”. She left Jenny any money left over once her debts were paid off.
Mary Knapton’s Will, Borthwick Institute for Archives, vol.152, fol. 84.
Primary Sources:
- York Courant
- York waterworks
- Company Admissions Registers
- Company Apprenticeship Registers
- York Probate Index
- York Deeds Registers
Tailoring trade:
On 3rd February 1750, Mary married Philip Knapton at All Saints, Pavement, York. Philip is recorded as a fellow mantua maker. Note: there are also records of a Philip Knapton as a peruke maker at this time, having read Sylvia Hogarth’s piece on mantua makers, we wonder if Philip might have been one of the few men who adopted their wife’s trade, especially as Mary was quite well-established? In the apprenticeship registers, there are indentures apprenticing individuals to both Mary and Philip, both together and independently. On 28th February 1753, Mary was admitted to the Merchant Taylor’s Company as a mantua maker. There is no evidence that Philip was ever admitted to the company.
In total, Mary took on fourteen apprentices, both in partnership with Philip and alone. This is one of the highest numbers in the Company for a woman. These included Alice Elston in 1753, Hannah Dale in 1757, Jane Bulmer in 1760, Mary Pallister in 1763, Elizabeth Waind in 1764, Ann Tuke in 1767, Dorothy Donn in 1769, Jane Ellis in 1770, Elizabeth Sadler in 1773, Catherine Brabb in 1774, Isabella Benson in 1777, Betty Cooper in 1779, Mary Kilner in 1781 and Ann Collings in 1785. However, there is a discrepancy for Elizabeth Waind, Isabella, Catherine and Betty as they are recorded as Philip’s apprentices in the County Apprentices records, but in the Merchant Taylor’s apprenticeship registers, they are recorded as Mary’s. This is likely why Smith only records Mary having 11 apprentices in his article. Jane Ellis and Mary Kilner both went on to be admitted to the Company as mantua makers. Unfortunately, Elizabeth ended up in poverty, with frequent entries to the Feasegate pawnbrokers.
We have made a short video of Mary and Philip Knapton’s life. click the video to view it
“MARY KNAPTON, SACQUE and MANTUA MAKER in DAVYGATE, YORK, Returns her most grateful acknowledgments to her friends for the many favours she has received, and solicits a continuance of them to herself and Daughter, whom she has taken into Partnership, and hopes from the improvement she has acquired in the fashionable fancy presses and by her late Residence in London with one of the first in the business to give satisfaction. All orders from the Country will be duly attended to, and their Favours gratefully acknowledged, by Their most obedient and very humble servants, M. and J. KNAPTON”.
Why should we care about Mary?
Like Alice, Mary left behind a huge legacy in terms of the numbers of girls she apprenticed, though they were not necessarily as successful as Alice’s apprentices.
Mary sits in the middle of an inter-generational tale of female tailors. Whilst it is not completely possible to confirm that Mary Merry was her mother, it would seem most likely, as she was married to Samuel. Even so, Mary’s daughter Jenny became a mantua maker herself.
Researcher Katy Leverett 2024
Secondary Sources:
- Hogarth, S. “Cherchez les femmes coverts: Finding women milliners and dressmakers in eighteenth century York”. York Historian 36 (2019): 24-38.
- Hogarth, S. “Luxury Retailing in Eighteenth Century York”. York Historian 35 (2018): 17-37.
- Tillot, P.M, ed. A History of Yorkshire: The City of York. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1961.
- Smith, S.D. “Women’s Admission to the Guilds in Early-Modern England: The Case of the York Merchant Tailors’ Company, 1693-1776”. Gender & History 17, no. 1 (2005): 99-126.