Old Vic's stockings go for £8000

Tuesday, 9th September 2008

Updated on Tuesday 9th September 2008
Written by Francesca Cookney

A statue of Queen Victoria situated outside the Queen Victoria Building in Sydney, Australia

A pair of black and white silk stockings believed to have belonged to Queen Victoria, have sold for £8000 at auction.

The buyer, a Mr David Alcock of North Wales, described himself as "over the moon" with his purchase. With a listing price of only £150 to £200, Mr Alcock had to beat some hefty competition from overseas, including bids from as far away as North America, before he could claim the royal hosiery.

"I was wary that they may go for such a high price", he told the media, "but we were fairly determined." The stockings will now go on display at the Ruddington Framework Knitters' Museum in Nottingham of which Mr Alcock's father-in-law is the curator. Former owner Mary Youings was naturally delighted with the result. Having inherited the stockings from her mother, the Derbyshire pensioner had recently unearthed them from a box in her loft.

She described how they probably came into the family from the Marr or Harland families of North Yorkshire in about 1910 but couldn't be sure of the details. Experts who examined the stockings gave the hand-stitched quality, the two-tone silk and not to mention the Royal Crest as evidence of royal heritage, believing them to have been worn by Vic herself in and around the 1870s.

And this is not the first time the auction house has dealt in Victorian legwear, having seen a pair of the old Queen's bloomers go for £4500 just last July.

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