Rhoda Moreland (fl. 1721 – 1736)

Rhoda Moreland was a milliner on Leadenhall Street and freemen of the Painter-Stainers’ Company.

Moreland was admitted to the Painter-Stainers’ Company by patrimony on 2 December 1724.[1] She was described as a ‘Milliner in Leadenhall Street’ in the company’s court minutes and this is corroborated by a Sun Fire Office insurance policy that she took out for her ‘goods and Merchandize’ on 13 May 1720, which confirmed her occupational identity as ‘milliner’ and her location ‘against Bricklayers hall in Leadenhall Street’.[2]

Section of John Rocque’s Map of London, 1746 showing the approximate location of Rhoda Moreland’s shop © 2011 Locating London’s Past

Yet, Moreland was already established as a milliner before she attained the freedom of the Painter-Stainers’ Company. She bound three apprentices independently in the early 1720s, followed by five female apprentices bound through the Painter-Stainers’ Company between 1725 and 1736.[3] Moreland increased her premiums after she was admitted to the Painter-Stainers’ Company, ostensibly because she could provide her apprentices with a pathway to secure their own freedom of a livery company and the City. The highest premium charged was £50.

Rhoda Moreland took out another insurance policy on 17 July 1727. At this point she was in a partnership with Elizabeth Kendall ‘at the Cap and Hand in Leadenhall Street’, and ‘their Household Goods and Stock in Trade’ were insured up to £500.[4] A marriage record suggests that Elizabeth Kendall was Rhoda Moreland’s sister, and this is very likely as sister-led co-partnerships in millinery were quite common in this period.[5]

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Footnotes

[1] London Metropolitan Archives (LMA) COL/CHD/FR/02/0444.

[2] Guildhall Library (GL) MS 5667/2 Painter-Stainers’ Company Court Minutes 1649-1793; LMA CLC/B/192/F/001/MS11936/011, Sun Fire Office Insurance Company Policy Registers, 1720, fol. 355.

[3] The National Archives (TNA) IR1/8, fol. 118; TNA IR1/10, fol. 58; GL MS 5667/2, Part 1; GL MS 5669/1, Painter-Stainers’ Company Apprentice Book, 1666-1795.

[4] LMA CLC/B/192/F/001/MS11936/024, Sun Fire Office Policy Register, 1727-1728, fol. 220.

[5] Ancestry.com. London and Surrey, England, Marriage Bonds and Allegations, 1597-1921 [database on-line]. Provo, UT, USA: Ancestry.com Operations, Inc., 2011.

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