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Category: Regency

Cosmetics – Regency Style

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This past weekend I spent some time thinking about cosmetics. I’m about out of my skin care products and make-up and so I have decisions to make.

Years ago I used Merle Norman cosmetics exclusively, both skin care products and make-up, but the store where I purchased them closed and I thought the company went out of business. But I found one in Georgia a couple of years ago, then looked on the internet and found a shop near me. So my last purchase was from Merle Norman.

Before that I was using Bare Minerals for make-up, products I do like a lot, but I wanted to try Merle Norman again. I’d also been using Avon Products for skin care.

Now I’m at a deciding point again. Which should I choose? Merle Norman? Bare Minerals? Avon?

The Regency woman had a lot fewer choices.

Actually, the Regency woman did not have a great need for make-up. The era was one that valued the natural look, in contrast with the Georgian era which favored white faces with rouged cheeks and black patches. Unfortunately, one of the main the ingredients of this Georgian make-up was lead, leading to disfigurement and even death.

For the natural look of the Regency, there were some tinted foundations, mostly used by older women. Rice powder or talc powder was sparingly used and a light touch of cheek tint was acceptable, as well as lip color, some of which was not too different from today’s lip gloss.

Here’s a great website that tells more about Regency cosmetics.

Skin care products were more widely used and for the same reasons I use them–to improve the skin and fight signs of aging. And for reasons I used to use them many moons ago–for skin eruptions or, as we called them, pimples.

One of the products used lead or mercury, both very toxic and harmful. Other products had familiar ingredients, like rose water and almond oil.

A problem with the skin care products of the Regency were that they might include ingredients like milk or cream that would spoil, so they didn’t have a long shelf life.

For more about Regency skin products, look here.

Here’s a whole book written in the late 1700s – The Toilet of Flora by Flora (a goddess).

And here is a podcast from Historic Williamsburg that talks about “the art of beauty” in the Georgian and Regency eras.

So….What is your favorite cosmetic or skin care product? Any advice for me?

Come to Diane’s blog THIS Thursday for my interview with Superromance author and pal, Darlene Gardner. (I forgot it was Thursday last week and missed posting this blog! THIS Thursday for sure.)

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Bug Control – Regency Style

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This weekend we had an ant infestation in our kitchen. Naturally, this would happen when the exterminator wasn’t available. We had to battle the army of ants all by ourselves. I went to the internet to see what weapons we might use against this assault.

I now know more than I ever wanted to know about ant control. Turns out you not only have to remove the temptation (In this case, sugar. Apparently some ants have a sweet tooth; other ants crave other things), you have to interrupt their scent trails. I wiped everything down in vinegar, but that didn’t seem like enough. One of the suggestions was to spray a mixture of essential peppermint oil and water in the areas where it was suspected the ants entered. Well, I had essential peppermint oil, but I didn’t have a spray bottle. Besides, I thought, if a dilution of essential oil would work, how much better could it be if I didn’t dilute it?

I sprinkled full-strength peppermint essential oil all around the window and the sink.

Five hours later, the scent of peppermint was still so strong it made us all feel sick. It made even pizza taste funny.

Today we’ve seen some strays, but I’m still hopeful we’ve solved the problem. I got to thinking. What would a housekeeper have done about an ant infestation in Regency times?

I could not find out what they would have done about ants in Regency times, but I did learn a little about “bug control.”

This is from The Art of Cookery Made Plain And Easy; which Far exceeds any Thing of the Kind yet published by Mrs Glasse (1784)



The Toilet and Cosmetic Arts in Ancient and Modern Times by Arnold J. Cooley (1866) tells about how to get rid of parasites, like the head louse (stiff brush, “occasional” soap and water, and pomade), the body louse (regular bathing), and the crab louse (a solution of corrosive sublimate and sal-ammoniac in soft-water), but I can hardly bear thinking about having to battle such bugs. Cooley also recommends tobacco smoke to drive away insects, such as mosquitos, gnats, and bed bugs. That just goes to show that insects aren’t dumb enough to want to breathe in tobacco smoke. 

Have you come across any other Regency era insect exterminating practices? 
Or, how do you get rid of ants?

Look for a new contest at my website today!

*The picture is “Mrs Sperling Murdering Flies” from Mrs. Hurst Dancing by Diana Sperling, charming watercolors created during the Regency. 

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Elections, Regency Style!

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Tomorrow is Election Day here in the USA and when you live in a swing state (Virginia) in the suburbs of the nation’s capital (Washington, D.C.), You. Cannot. Escape. This. Fact. Ever.

If I lived in Regency England, though, things would be a lot different. An election would only be for members of the House of Commons. In the early 1800s, the House of Lords consisted of hereditary peers and, of course, the king was not elected. Members of Parliament served until Parliament was dissolved, every five years unless emergency extensions were necessary.

Fairness was a rare commodity in election to the House of Commons. Some “pocket boroughs” were in the pocket of the local magnate or his designee and, therefore, had no real opposition. Other “rotten boroughs” might have small enough numbers of voters that all could be successfully bribed, while areas as densely populated as Manchester had no representative. For example, Old Sarum in Wiltshire had three houses and seven voters. The Reform Act of 1832 dissolved the rotten boroughs and more evenly distributed representation.

Like in the US, there were two main political parties. Generally speaking, the Tories were conservative, wanting to maintain the status quo, while the Whigs advocated electoral, parliamentary, and social reform. After the French Revolution, the Tory party experienced years of largely uncontested power. Before he became Prince Regent, George IV supported Whig sentiments, but when in power, he turned Tory.

The only people who could vote in Regency England were male landowners. Only one man in seven could vote in England; one in 44 in Scotland. Women did not earn full voting rights in the UK until 1928.

So when I cast my vote tomorrow, I’ll be grateful that I have a voice in my government and I’ll appreciate how different it would have been if I had lived in my beloved Regency England.

Go vote!!!

(P.S. I’ll be picking the winner of one download of Susanna’s An Infamous Marriage tonight, so you can still comment today. Susanna will be adding to her contest all Risky commenters who gave her an email address)

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Napoleonic War Veterans

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Yesterday was Veteran’s Day in the USA, a day we remember and honor the service of our military veterans. Both our Veteran’s Day and the UK’s Remembrance Day had their origins in Armistice Day, commemorating the armistice between the Allies of World War I and Germany for the cessation of hostilities to take at “the eleventh hour of the eleventh day of the eleventh month” of 1918.

After the Napoleonic Wars, though, a war that cost the lives of over five million people overall, no such honors were forthcoming. In fact, most officers and regular army returned to more struggles.

Officers who no longer had a regiment were placed on half-pay, which for some meant debt, eventual poverty, and the workhouse. Some tried to keep up the trappings of their rank only to fall deeper and deeper into debt. The Gentleman’s Magazine in November 1819 reported the death of one such officer. Lieutenant Henry Bowerman, late of the 56th Regiment of Foot, and his 11 and 12 year old sons, died in the Norwood workhouse.

Regular soldiers received no such half-pay, but some were eligible to be in-pensioners at the Royal Hospitals. The hospitals’ commissioners decided if a man was able to earn some sort of living and be sent as an out-pensioner. Sergeant Thomas Jackson, who lost a leg in the war, was deemed young and fit enough to work. His pension was one shilling a day.  He’d spent 12 years in the army.

Thousands of soldiers lined the streets with no occupation but drink. Few turned to begging, though, but professional beggars took their place by pretending to starving soldiers. Some fared adequately, marrying well or finding work. Benjamin Harris, whose memoirs about being in the Rifles certainly must have informed Bernard Cornwell’s Sharpe series, returned to being a shoemaker, but always considered his service in the war the only part of his life “worthy of remembrance.”

War memorials of the Napoleonic War soldier are nearly non-existent, existing mostly on graves or memorials to individual soldiers. A marble slab at one end of the nave in a parish church in Buckinghamshire, reads:

SACRED TO THE MEMORY OF
CHARLES EELES ESQ
Late Captain in his Majesty’s 95th Rifle Regiment,
who after serving with the British Army Thro’
the various campaigns in the Spanish Peninsula,
Terminated his Glorious Career
on the 18th of June 1815, in the 30th year of his age.
He fell nobly in his country’s cause on the ever
memorial field of Waterloo.
Esteemed,  Lamented, and Beloved.

Most Napoleonic soldiers WERE buried in fields near the battles in which they fought and died, their bodies plundered and left half-naked.

Perhaps we remember them, though, in our imaginations and our fascination with the Napoleonic War. We keep them alive in our books. Some we even reward with a happily ever after.

The information in this blog came from one of my favorite research books, Redcoat: The British Soldier in the Age of Horse and Musket by Richard Holmes. Holmes explains everything about what it was like to be a soldier in the “Age of Brown Bess.”

Do you have a favorite book or movie involving a soldier? For me it was definitely the Sharpe series, on audiobook as read by William Gaminara

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Blogging About A Blog About Blogs

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As I’ve said before, I love Pinterest. I always find something new on it, something to delight. Yesterday I came across a pin of History Blogs. Of course I lost them and in a search to find them, I discovered many more.

I searched Pinterest on “History Blogs” and this is an example of what I found–
The History Files – an eclectic compilation of history topics, not Regency, but lots of interesting stuff.
Scandalous Women – by our Risky friend, Elizabeth Kerri Mahon
In theWords of Women – another “women in history” blog, but who can ever tire of that?

But I wanted to see if there was something more specific to the Regency, so I looked at another Pinterest entry, “Regency and History” blogs. Very cool! Look at this!
Regency History – the first entry I came across was one giving links to online copies of La Belle Assemble
Historical Trinkets – the entry there was about Caroline of Brunswick.
Food History Jottings – there’s a blog about a syllabub machine and one about Christmas pudding and more
Regency Library 
Georgian London
Jane Austen’s World (one of my favorites)
The House Historian

I don’t really understand why I didn’t find Risky Regencies on one of the sites. Or Number One London. But, besides that, there’s a bunch of history treasure here!

What’s your favorite History blog?…besides Risky Regencies, that is!

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