FOUR PAIRS OF GENTLEMAN'S PANTALOONS, CIRCA 1790-1820 in varying weights of unlined white cotton, three pairs with a four-button waist and one pair with a two-button waist, three pairs with tie-flies and one with a button-fly, all with French bearers, with tie-tighteners at knees and centre backs (varying conditions but all with staining and some damage) Pantaloons were fashionable wear for European gentlemen from the 1790s until circa 1820 and were worn in civilian clothes as well as in naval and military uniform, frequently being made in stretch cotton kerseymere and generally worn with pumps or soft knee-length boots of the type known as 'hessians'. These pantaloons resemble what would now be known as 'jodhpurs', a type of legwear derived from the Indian pajama trousers, and this fact, together with their very light weight and manufacture from thin cotton, may indicate that they were made in India for wear in the 1790s by General George Vaughan Hart. However, British naval officers also wore white pantaloons, with hessian boots, until the 1820s and so they may equally have been worn by Commander George Vaughan Hart during his early days in the Royal Navy.