Chris Woodyard
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chriswoodyard.bsky.social
Chris Woodyard
@chriswoodyard.bsky.social
1.9K followers 210 following 1.6K posts
Author A is for Arsenic: An ABC of Victorian Death, The Victorian Book of the Dead, 10 books on ghosts in Ohio and elsewhere. Death, mourning, costume, ghosts, Forteana. Podcast: Boggart and Banshee https://thevictorianbookofthedead.wordpress.com: Blog
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chriswoodyard.bsky.social
#TheVictorianBookoftheDead
The Widower, Carl Spitzweg, 1844
sammlung.staedelmuseum.de/en/work/the-...
Man in black suit with knee breeches, with a top hat, cane, and white handkerchief, sits on a bench by a garden path and watches two women, one in blue and one in pink, walk along the path.
November 18, 2025 at 2:00 PM
chriswoodyard.bsky.social
#TheVictorianBookoftheDead
Widowed and Fatherless, Leon Jean Bazile Perrault, 1874
blackcountryhistory.org/collections/...
Women in a black dress with semi-transparent, banded sleeves, sits drowsing by the side of her child sleeping in a draped crib.
November 18, 2025 at 1:57 PM
chriswoodyard.bsky.social
#TheVictorianBookoftheDead Elegant black hearse, c. 1885-1890, with urns, garlands, and shields on the roof. Originally from Schoonhoven-Buytendijk stables in Utrecht.
collectie.centraalmuseum.nl/details/coll...
Photograph of a 19th century hearse with black draperies on sides and on the driver's seat, black urns and garlands on the roof, and metal lanterns on each corner.
November 17, 2025 at 4:57 PM
chriswoodyard.bsky.social
#TheVictorianBookoftheDead Mourning ring, 1801, of black enamel, with a hair locket bezel framed in pearls. The locket swivels with the inscription "JANE NICKSON OB: 21 Dec. 1801 AE: 60" on the reverse.
www.sothebys.com/en/auctions/...
Ring with rectangular bezel with a glass hair locket framed in pearls. The rest of the ring is gold with black enamel with a leaf pattern.
November 17, 2025 at 4:51 PM
chriswoodyard.bsky.social
Grinning and bearing it on #MementoMoriMonday
Peyst er wel op
1821 memorial for Franciscus Schramme
adlib.catharijneconvent.nl/Details/coll...
#TheVictorianBookoftheDead
Black and white image of skull with bared teeth on crossed bones on a stone plinth, skull and stone wreathed in vines.
November 17, 2025 at 4:38 PM
chriswoodyard.bsky.social
It does sound like an explosion--great description! It is not the same as bombazine, which was a wool or wool/silk fabric sometimes with a slight lustre. Crape was made of silk (or sometimes silk/wool) and has a crinkled finish added by running it through rollers. 1) Crape 2) Bombazine
close up view of black crinkled crape fabric Long black dress with puckered trim on the skirt, a fitted bodice, and white collars and cuffs.
November 16, 2025 at 10:43 PM
chriswoodyard.bsky.social
#TheVictorianBookoftheDead #NationalButtonDay One indication of mourning for soldiers was a piece of crape covering the second button of the tunic. This was not an officially approved symbol of mourning.
Photo from 1914
www.europeana1914-1918.eu/en/contribut...
Photograph of a family, 1914. The boy in a light-colored tunic suit with dark shoes and stockings; the woman in a black taffeta blouse and dark skirt, holding the boy's hand. The man is in military uniform with a black belt and a single black-covered button on his tunic.
November 16, 2025 at 3:26 PM
chriswoodyard.bsky.social
#TheVictorianBookoftheDead #NationalButtonDay
Mourning dress of crape and imperial serge, with several rows of buttons, which might have been cloth-covered or of glass molded to look like crape, 1895
Illustration of woman wearing a black dress with large puffy sleeves, trimmed with several rows of buttons. She also wears a ribboned hat. Round button molded to look like mourning crape fabric.
November 16, 2025 at 3:16 PM
chriswoodyard.bsky.social
#TheVictorianBookoftheDead #NationalButtonDay
Two glass mourning buttons textured to look like mourning crape. The "beads" framing the first button are molded in one piece to look like faceted jet.
Round button with crape-textured glass center and a frame molded to look like faceted glass beads Round button textured to look like black mourning crape
November 16, 2025 at 3:11 PM
chriswoodyard.bsky.social
#TheVictorianBookoftheDead A mourning locket in onyx and enamel with an initial of pearls set in gold.
www.gazette-drouot.com/lots/9181996...
An oval black locket with a shiny finish, topped with a swirling initial in gold and pearls. The glass of the locket insert is shown at the right.
November 15, 2025 at 2:53 PM
chriswoodyard.bsky.social
#TheVictorianBookoftheDead This elegant silk cape, with its neo-Jacobean cutwork and black beadwork roses, dates from the 1890s. The matte black silk could suggest either luxe half-mourning or fashionable evening wear.
collections.royal-needlework.org.uk/object-col-86
Elegant black cape with beadwork flowers, cutwork and cascades of satin down the front and frills of satin around the collar. Pleated hem Elegant black cape with beadwork and cutwork in chevron pattern and stripes, and satin frills around the collar. Pleated hem Elegant black cape with beadwork flowers, cutwork and cascades of satin down the front and frills of satin around the collar. Pleated hem
November 15, 2025 at 2:42 PM
chriswoodyard.bsky.social
#Caturday mood.

I Am a Cat, K. Ando, 1906
brbl-dl.library.yale.edu
Book cover of I Am A Cat by K. Ando. Grubby cream background with a electrified black cat with whiskers spraying from ears and cheeks staring at the reader.
November 15, 2025 at 2:31 PM
chriswoodyard.bsky.social
For #ForteanFriday on #NationalPickleDay, I stretch the definition of "pickled" in "Pickled to Death": gruesome stories of deaths from embalming fluid poisoning, often mistaken for alcohol.
thevictorianbookofthedead.wordpress.com/2018/05/16/p...
#TheVictorianBookoftheDead
Joke bottle of whiskey labeled as "Old Croak" embalming fluid with a dead black bird lying on its back.
November 14, 2025 at 4:37 PM
chriswoodyard.bsky.social
#PhantomsFriday Myers Hall, Wittenberg Univ., Springfield, Ohio, is said to have been a Civil War hospital. A horse was led up to the top floor to see his dying master. The horse balked at descending the stairs, so he was shot and his ghost is still heard galloping back and forth.
[Haunted Ohio V]
A tall, red-brick building with many windows and a classical, columned white front with a cupola atop a long flight of stairs. The building stands on a hill covered with snow, framed by bare trees against a blue sky.
November 14, 2025 at 1:50 PM
chriswoodyard.bsky.social
#TheVictorianBookoftheDead
L'Espouse en Deuil, Jean-Pierre Laurens, 1922
Alice Diéterle, the artist's sister-in-law is shown with her 3-year-old son Raymond Join. Her husband Raymond René Join, of the 129th Infantry, died, aged 27, in 1918.
Musée des Beaux-Arts de la Ville de Paris
Dark-haired woman in long black cape pushing a green pram with a child in a blue smock sitting up in it. They walk before a dirt field with shocks of grain in the background.
November 13, 2025 at 3:00 PM
chriswoodyard.bsky.social
#TheVictorianBookoftheDead
Modern miniature model of a white hearse
Elaborately draped white streetcar hearse, 1891
White hearse with driver and white-netted horses, c. 1900 courtesy of Neil Regan Funeral Home, Scranton, PA.
White hearses were generally used for children or the unmarried.
Miniature model of a white hearse with a tiny coffin inside White railway or trolley hearse with elaborately draped curtains White hearse drawn by horses draped in white nets.
November 13, 2025 at 2:53 PM
chriswoodyard.bsky.social
#FolkloreThursday
Eccles Wakes: Racing for the Smock, Joseph Parry, 1808
Held on the 1st Sunday in September for 3 days, with "ancient and modern sports," and feasting on Eccles cakes, this painting shows men racing on donkeys to win the smock held aloft at the right.
artuk.org/discover/art...
A crowd of people is watching 3 men race on donkeys while a smock is hoisted aloft on a cross-like stick.
November 13, 2025 at 2:05 PM
chriswoodyard.bsky.social
#TheVictorianBookoftheDead "Crape Pullers" - members of a somewhat suspect mortuary profession.
thevictorianbookofthedead.wordpress.com/2025/11/12/c...
Funeral flowers catalog showing made-up arrangements and wire frames on which to build funeral flowers.
November 12, 2025 at 1:29 PM
chriswoodyard.bsky.social
#WorldPneumoniaDay 1896
First doctor. "I ordered him an ice-cold bath every morning." Second doctor. "What, when he had influenza!"
First doctor. "Yes, it will give him pneumonia, and I made my whole reputation curing that!" wellcomecollection.org/works/zdb7qg...
#TheVictorianBookoftheDead
Two men in evening dress, one leaning against a chair with his hand to his cheek; the other with hands in his pockets, looking very satisfied with himself.
November 12, 2025 at 1:21 PM
chriswoodyard.bsky.social
#WorldPneumoniaDay
Among the Men of Death, Pneumonia Ranks Third
US Public Health Service poster c. 1918-1919?
www.jstor.org/stable/commu...
#TheVictorianBookoftheDead
Skeleton in robe and helmet, holding a sword, leads an army of skeletons, some holding banners labeled Heart Disease, Cancer, Pneumonia.
November 12, 2025 at 1:19 PM
chriswoodyard.bsky.social
#WyrdWednesday Boudica, Queen of the Iceni, who led a revolt against the Roman occupation of Britain.
"In stature she was very tall, in appearance most terrifying, in the glance of her eye most fierce, and her voice was harsh."

Photo by Paul Walter
commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?...
Black metal statue of crowned woman in long robe in a chariot, holding a spear, behind two rearing horses.
November 12, 2025 at 1:12 PM
chriswoodyard.bsky.social
#TheVictorianBookoftheDead At first glance, an austere mourning gown, c. 1884-1885. The details, a black-beaded collar and cuffs, and a brocade panel on the skirt, suggest a wearer not far into second mourning, "lightening" her deep mourning only slightly.
Musées départementaux de la Haute-Saône
Severe black dress with slight beading around neck and cuffs. Side view of black dress with brocade panel to one side and a bustle silhouette. Rear view of a severe black dress with a slight train and bustle.
November 11, 2025 at 3:54 PM
chriswoodyard.bsky.social
#TheVictorianBookoftheDead Black enamel mourning cross pendant lavishly trimmed with pearl tendrils and a diamond star. Hair locket on the reverse. For a very merry widow, perhaps.
www.1stdibs.com/jewelry/neck...
black cross with pearl tendrils on all arms and a diamond star centered around a pearl. Gold-colored metal cross with glass locket at the arms crossing.
November 11, 2025 at 3:45 PM
chriswoodyard.bsky.social
#TheVictorianBookoftheDead 1887 peaked mourning hat of crape trimmed with dull black pins with pyramid-shaped heads holding a long crape veil.
antiquedress.com/item6507.htm
Mannequin head wearing a black crape bonnet that comes to a peak over the forehead, set with pyramid-shaped pins and with a black veil attached. Mannequin head wearing a peaked mourning hat with a long flowing crape veil Back view of a crape mourning hat with long veil attached.
November 10, 2025 at 4:45 PM
chriswoodyard.bsky.social
#TheVictorianBookoftheDead
The Veil, Fernand Khnopff, 1887
charcoal and graphite www.artic.edu/artworks/111...
Grainy textured image of a woman in profile in a full-skirted dress with her hands over her noise and chin, shrouded in a long veil.
November 10, 2025 at 4:41 PM