We placed two sturdy pull tabs inside each boot.  If you do not have boot hooks, It’s easy enough to carry a couple of leather laces in your pocket. Run a leather lace or sturdy cord through each tab and use them to pull the boot upward. 

The “pass line” where your foot is going through the curve is the tightest part of the boot but a shake of talcum powder and a pair of sturdy leather laces will get the boot on. 

Paul Revere’s boot has a natural color cuff of heavy, supple glove leather.  When the boot comes off the bench, the cuff is turned all the way down.  There is plenty of leather cuff for you to easily roll up the cuff to whatever height you desire.

The object is to avoid any gap below your breeches or any show of breeches cuff or stocking.  The functional cuff also may be turned up to protect a rider’s knees and prevent the entrance of rainwater, etc.

“By 1727 the riding bootleg had become softer and closer-fitting……(the) jockey in close-fitting boots with brown tops…..the top was turned down below the knee for greater mobility, showing the brown lining.  It was soon adapted for fashionable wear.  .. … These are the boots with brown top featured in caricatures of John Bull, ……The top boots were worn by Thomas Jefferson, now in the Smithsonian are of this type. Quotes from June Swann’s “Shoes”    ISBN 0 7134 09428

Full and half sizes 5EE to 15EE.  Ladies should take 1 1/2 size smaller.

ALL SALES FINAL – NO RETURNS

Black & Natural laced Half Boots

Several names for the same boot. This type of footwear was seen in paintings of English sporting scenes in the mid-1700s. It was firmly established in the new Republic before the Revolution. 

The Natural Half Boot, Colonial to begin with,  later became the proper, “four inches above the ankle” Jefferson Bootee for 1812, Seminole War and Mexican War.  Remember, all laced shoes were called “Jefferson” until the 1880s.

All leather, 8 lace holes, natural color rough-out half boot. This is a left/right boot.

Full and half sizes 7 to 15, widths D and EE

Hi-Lows,  Buskins,  Trekkers 

Black & Natural laced Half Boots

Several names for the same boot. This type of footwear was seen in paintings of English sporting scenes in the mid-1700s. It was firmly established in the new Republic before the Revolution. Thomas Jefferson’s hi-low “Overshoes” may be seen in “Collector’s Illustrated.   Encyclopedia of the American Revolution”. Castle Books 1975 Neumann and Kravic (pg 123)

“There were also half boots from the 1750s, cut a little higher than modern ankle boots, which descend from them and worn for shooting and by the military. St James Chronicle, 1763, comments on ‘tradesmen who ape their betters….breeches almost met by a pair of shoes that reached about three and a quarter inches above the ankles.’  They were typical wear for both sides during the American War of Independence  (see Peale’s portrait of Captain John Harleston of Chicago.)

The Hi-Lows are 4 “above the ankle, in Natural rough-out leather with a 1″stacked leather heel.

Full and half sizes 6D to 15EE, 

As to the fit, since the leather on the toe slopes, we suggest 1/2 size larger than your modern dress shoes. We carry widths of D and EE which are the same as modern sizing.

Full and half sizes 7 to 15, widths D and EE meet the sizing of modern shoes, but you may need an extra size as the sloop of the leather to the toe, may need more room in front of the big toe.  That is what gives the boot the look of the 18th Century.

Trekkers come with a pair of leather laces.