We can file this short series consisting of excerpts from a couple of articles published several years ago under something I like to call “It Was a Victorian Thing”. Last week the curious nineteenth century headline, “Saved by Her Corset” was analyzed. This week’s headline was seen in newspapers after corset makers switched from whalebone to steel to fashionably shape female Victorian waists.
Killed by Her Corset
While researching “Saved by Her Corset” headlines I began noticing “Killed by Corset” headlines as well, although these deaths weren’t caused by tight-lacing as doomful doctors had hypothesized for decades. Just as there was a reason for “Saved by Her Corset” headlines, there was a reason for “Killed by Corset” headlines.
Many of the “Killed” headlines occurred after corset designers began using steel stays. When the cost of whalebone increased dramatically in 1876, winter corsets would be fitted with steel stays that season, despite the dangers:
Owing to the disaster to the Arctic fleet, whalebone has gone up nearly 50 per cent in value, and only steel corsets will be worn this winter. Steel corsets are more objectionable than whalebone, on the ground of danger from lightning, but as there is a good deal more “give” to them, even when embraced by the left arm, we haven’t much of an opinion of a girl who won’t be willing to risk the lightning.22
Taking a fully steel-corseted stroll during a lightning storm was indeed a deadly hazard. This story was tragic in more ways than one:
On Allum Creek, in the county of Franklin, we are informed that a young lady was struck by lightning, and expired immediately. She had on a steel corset board, which it is supposed drawed [sic] the lightning. Young ladies should be cautious how they make use of steel. She was to have been married in a few weeks. This is an evidence that “in the midst of life we are in death.”23
Steel Corsets
Three young ladies were killed by lightning at Jacobsboro, Ohio, Sunday, while returning home from church. It is thought that their steel corsets was [sic] the cause of their death, as a young lady who was without a steel corset was only stunned. Now what young lady will discard steel corsets on this warning?24
Killed by Her Corset Stays
Mrs. George Lewis and Mrs. Frank Sheets were driving today when their horse ran away. Mrs. Lewis jumped and broker her arm. Mrs. Sheets was thrown from the buggy, her corset broke and the stays were driven into her stomach, killing her.25
Killed by a Corset
A lady bicyclist was killed in Massachusetts yesterday by having a corset steel run into her heart. This all goes to show the folly of trying to be a new woman and at the same time sticking to the foibles and superstitions of the old woman. Cycling is certainly the avocation of the new woman – and, in fact, sometimes seems to be the vocation; while the corset belongs without a doubt to the ante-bloomer woman. An attempt to reconcile these two extremes is bound to prove futile.26
Miss Friend’s Tight Stays Displaced Her Heart and Ended Life
Miss Frankie Friend, aged 27, of Norwalk, died here last night under peculiar circumstances. She got off a car from Cleveland and became faint and weak. She was assisted to the waiting room by two women and later set to a physician’s office. She was dead when placed on a couch.
A post-mortem examination today showed her heart to be entirely out of place on account of her corset, which was ten sizes too small. Tight lacing killed her.27
The corset wasn’t merely an undergarment – it reflected societal and cultural norms and more than a few controversies of the Victorian era. Yet, the ladies still argued mightily for its virtues.
There is no doubt that Fashion makes the world more brilliant – a better place to live in.28
Some argued just as vociferously against corsets, forming “anti-lacing” societies. I’m always amazed at what Victorians, in particular, found to fret, fume, feud and fight over. Someday I’ll have to write about the “butter battle” – oh, what a feud that was!
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