There are tons of
mostly satirical and often scandalous political cartoons of the Duchess of Devonshire in 1784. She defied convention and canvassed tirelessly for Charles James Fox during the Westminster election of that year and garnered a lot of negative attention as a result. Many of the cartoons are purposely unflattering, playing up masculine elements in her looks and dress, because it was considered unlady-like for Georgiana to be canvassing for Fox in this way. Some even show her with a 5 o'clock shadow!
But I thought these cartoons might be a great source for what she might have
actually worn in the way of riding habits. So I went through a bunch of online image archives and culled the ones depicting her in a riding habit (or at least a jacket) and made close ups of them. I've linked sources to the titles of the cartoons below each image. While they ARE political cartoons and we don't know that she actually wore any of these outfits, we DO know she wore both buff and blue
and riding habits often enough that they were often mentioned in the press.
It's interesting to see that when she's depicted wearing a riding habit they seem to fall into two distinct styles. Ones which are overtly military and slightly old fashioned looking like the one of the right or these below:
And habits that to my eye look a bit more fashionable and true to 1780s styles like these:
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The Departure - Harriet, Georgiana's sister who often canvassed with her, Charles Fox and Georgiana |
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The Duchesses Purchasing a Brush - Harriet and Georgiana
Probably a riff on the quote that "Her Grace sometimes rides about in a black riding habit,
which is very convenient in case she should enter into a contract with a chimney sweeper." |
But you'll notice they all have one thing in common - the hat! When wearing a habit she is always depicted wearing a large hat with feathers, and often fox tails and a cockade or ribbon favor which says "Fox."
I'll do another post sometime soon on the other fashions Georgiana wears in the political cartoons.
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