s as at present, blue coats and gilt
buttons being in fashion. By an Act passed in the 4th of William and
Mary foreign buttons made of hair were forbidden to be imported. By
another Act, in the 8th of Queen Anne it was decreed that "any taylor or
other person convicted of making, covering, selling, using, or setting
on to a garment any buttons covered with cloth, or other stuff of which
garments are made, shall forfeit five pounds for every dozen of such
buttons, or in proportion for any lesser quantity;" by an Act of the
seventh of George the First, "any wearer of such unlawful buttons is
liable to the penalty of forty shillings per dozen, and in proportion
for any lesser quantity." Several cases are on record in which tradesmen
have been heavily fined under these; strange laws, and before they were
repealed it is related by Dr. Doran (in 1855) that one individual not
only got out of paying for a suit of clothes because of the illegality
of the tailor in using covered buttons, but actually sued the
unfortunate "snip" for the informer's share of the penalties, the
funniest part of the tale being that the judge who decided the case, the
barrister who pleaded the statute, and the client who gained the clothes
he ought to have paid for, were all of them buttoned contrary to law.
These Acts were originally enforced to protect the many thousands who at
the time were employed in making buttons of silk, thread, &c., by hand,
and _not_, as is generally supposed, in favour of the metal button
manufacturers, though on April 4, 1791, Thomas Gem, the solicitor to the
committee for the protection of the button trade, advertised a reward
for any information against the wearers of the unlawful covered buttons.
The "gilt button days" of Birmingham was a time of rare prosperity, and
dire was the distress when, like the old buckles, the fashion of wearing
the gilt on the blue went out. Deputations to royalty had no effect in
staying the change, and thousands were thrown on the parish. It was
sought to revive the old style in 1850, when a deputation of button
makers solicited Prince Albert to patronise the metallic buttons for
gentlemen's coats, but Fashion's fiat was not to be gainsayed. John
Taylor, High Sheriff of Warwickshire in 1756, is said to have sent out
about L800 worth of buttons per week. Papier mache buttons came in with
Henry Clay's patent in 1778. He also made buttons of slate. Boulton, of
Soho, was the first to bring out ste