Custom Made Shoes/boots

[Mogorilla]

Question.  I know the typical boot was made on the straight as were the brogans I believe.  If you had the money and had a cobbler do the work, were the shoes/boots custom fit to the foot, i.e. a left and right?  I ask because the fact that the Romans made their military caligae as left and rights, so the concept of having a shoe fit your foot right off is not a new one.  Why was it seemingly forgotten in the 1700 and 1800s?

[St. George]

Understand first that this is a 'generalization' and no doubt there is far more available history on this one.

I'm speaking from the 'Army' side and from those odd bits of information that one picks up when collecting and researching.

The American military used a straight last for their issued footgear, and that wouldn't change until WWI with the development of the 'Munson' last - an honest pair of Left and Right Field Shoes.

Hell - in many cases - the issue shoes and boots were sometimes the first pair of footgear any of the young men had ever owned and the Drillmasters had to teach them 'which' foot was which.
One enterprising NCO hit on the fact that the preponderance of new recruits were of farmboy stock and he devised a foolproof method of teaching them by having them tie some Hay on the Left and some Straw on the right.

'Hayfoot',- Strawfoot', Hayfoot'...! -  would become the  'Left', 'Right', 'Left'...! - so beloved by toung troops everywhere.
No farmboy could ever mistake one for the other...

In adopting the 'Munson' last - they took note of the lessons learned from the comments and foot problems of a couple of generations of soldiery who were using up the gear left from the Civil War.

As to civilian cobbler-made shoes - all of the surviving pairs of the period that are seen are pretty much straight last - though custom work could be produced and was - especially for those with any sort of anomaly to their foot or those who wanted to be better shod than their fellowman.

Machine-made shoes are like those of the above 'standard' of the times - and those too are only seen with a straight last - but being machine-made - it's perhaps more understandable, due in part to the manufacturing process.

Good Luck with your further research...

Vaya,

Scouts Out!