Barbara Brackman's MATERIAL CULTURE: Edward Bancroft: Dyes & Spies

Metropolitan Museum of Art, About 1840

Pansies (violas) printed in drab style using

a mordant printing method.

Edward Bartholomew Bancroft (1744–1821) was a chemist who discovered a profitable natural dye derived from the American black oak tree. When the American colonies were subjects of King George III, Bancroft, born in Massachusetts and living in Guiana, realized that the inner bark of Quercus velutina would dye fiber a variety of shades from yellow through green to almost a true black, depending on the mordant used. He called the dye powder Quercitron and applied for a British patent on its distribution in 1771.

Above & below, two pillar prints dyed with Quercitron,

collection of the Victoria & Albert Museum

Early 19th century, about 1805.

Quercitron was quite useful, giving printers a

colorfast yellow as well as a way to print shades

from olive drab green through a variety of browns.

The print style became known as drab.

Another drab pillar print from England

probably done after Bancroft's patent expired.

The quercitron patent lasted until 1799 and temporarily profited Bancroft and his American brother Daniel as well as Captain John Paul Jones and other business partners, but Bancroft was never as good at business as he was at observation of the natural world and he died an Englishman in debt.

Detail of a quilt from the Shelburne Museum collection

Reading Walter Isaacson's biography of Benjamin Franklin I came across an account of Franklin's years in Europe as an agent of the rebellious American colonies. Franklin met Bancroft in England; the men had much in common and became friends. One major difference, however, was Franklin's commitment to the American revolution and Bancroft's Tory sentiments, which he kept a secret. As Franklin tried to woo France into supporting the rebellious Americans he enlisted Bancroft as secretary to the American Commission in Paris and counted on Bancroft to keep him informed as to British opinion and activities, in essence a spy.

But Franklin misjudged Bancroft who turned double

agent spying on the American Commission for Britain,

a betrayal discovered a century later.

Patchwork chair cover with a drab-style ruffle

from the collection of the D.A.R. Museum

Fairchild's Dictionary of Textiles tells us that drab style prints

were popular for less than a decade after the Bancroft patent expired.

Tied wholecloth quilt with a drab style floral probably

dating to after 1810.

1821 ad in Camden, South Carolina forg drab wools

That date range that is likely based on the research of Peter Floud of the Victoria and Albert Museum, who published "The Drab Style and the Designs of Daniel Goddard." in Connoisseur 139 (June 1957). But the date seems too narrow, particularly when dating quilts.

Quilt by Sarah Clark Ellis Ide (1822-1902),

estimated date 1845.

https://www.google.com/books/edition/Massachusetts_Quilts/quNEcnPiM1cC?hl=en&gbpv=1&dq=quilt+sarah+clark+ide&pg=PA93&printsec=frontcover

Sarah's mid-century quilts uses drab style prints in the

hexagons as well as the border.

When considering patchwork with drab style prints one should move the date to perhaps as late as 1840. There is also a difference of opinion as to what constitutes "drab style" A narrow definition sticks to the colors obtainable with quercitron, the yellow to green and brown range.

Spencer Museum of Art at the University of Kansas

Drab style yellow and brown

Blue could be added---penciled by hand with a brush as in this sample from the Winterthur's collection shown in Heather Hansen's 2011 thesis, the most comprehensive discussion of drab style and quercitron since Floud's. Read The quest for quercitron: revealing the story of a forgotten dye.

https://udspace.udel.edu/handle/19716/9800