What were some 'must have' items that have gone out of fashion?

MailOnline logo

• Is there a question to which you want to know the answer? Or do you know the answer to a question here?
• Write to: Charles Legge, Answers To Correspondents, Daily Mail, 9 Derry Street, London W8 5HY or email [email protected]

QUESTION: What were some 'must have' items that have gone permanently out of fashion?

With 1980s fashion coming back into style, which is mostly a good thing, there are a few items that can stay put. Sweatbands, for instance: Olivia Newton-John briefly made them trendy with the suggestive video for her hit song Physical. Unfortunately, on mere mortals they look rubbish. Oh, and then there's the Spandex bodysuit.

Likewise the shell suit, the brightly patterned polyester trouser and jacket combo, has mercifully gone.

Another Eighties staple that has (mostly) disappeared is denim dungarees, although prancing around in them didn't do Dexy's Midnight Runners much harm.

Emma Bunton, aka the Spice Girls' Baby Spice, popularised platform soles in the 1990s with her platform trainers. While they may look fabulous, they were lethal. Emma admitted she'd broken many bones in them. Other fashion faux pas from the era include belly chains, crochet knitted shirts and devoré (burnout velvet) bodysuits.

Alice Williams, Harrogate, North Yorks.

I'd suggest the handwritten letter. It has sadly been replaced by more immediate forms of communication, such as text and email. We have lost a tool to express our feelings in a more meaningful and heartfelt way.

Ken Douglas, Canterbury, Kent.

In the early 80s, Cabbage Patch Dolls had mothers fighting in the aisles. The whole conceit was that these ugly-but-cute humanoid babies grew out of a literal cabbage patch. Mercifully, they seem to have gone the way of the dodo.

Heather Coles, Telford, Shropshire.

QUESTION: How come an army musket was called Brown Bess?

The Land Pattern flintlock musket, to give it its proper name, was introduced into the British Army in 1722 and remained in use until the middle of the 19th century, making it by far the longest-serving firearm ever used by the Army. It was designed by Andrew Dolep, a Dutch gunmaker who settled in London.

The origins of the nickname Brown Bess are unclear. There are some suggestions it was derived from the nickname Good Queen Bess, attached to Queen Elizabeth I, but there is no evidence for that.

There are two more credible candidates for the origin of the name.

The first is the brown colouring of the barrel after treatment, with the name attached, as soldiers were exhorted to treat their firearms with the same consideration (or better) than they would their wives or girlfriends. Bess has long been a popular short form for Elizabeth, so it would have been a popular name for something viewed as female.

The second possible candidate is that the name was taken from the German braun buchse, meaning brown gun. From the time George I took the throne in 1714 there were strong German influences within the British Army, and that may have been how the German name entered common use. Between 1803 and 1816 there was even a King's German Legion in the British Army, made up of about 14,000 German recruits, serving during the Napoleonic wars.

Bob Dillon, Edinburgh.

QUESTION: Have any remains from the casualties of the 1691 Battle of Aughrim been found?

The Battle of Aughrim was the last major engagement during the Williamite War in Ireland, fought on July 12, 1691, near the village of Aughrim in County Galway.

Aughrim was the decisive battle of the war, where the forces of the deposed Catholic King James II were routed by the Protestant forces loyal to King William III. The outcome secured Protestant control over Ireland, marking a pivotal point in Irish history. Around 7,000 people were killed, while the much memorialised Battle of the Boyne (1690) saw loss of life of less than a third of that. The two kings were absent at Aughrim; their armies were led instead by French and Dutch generals, which may explain why Boyne has become better known.

The 2-3,000 dead Williamites were buried, probably in mass graves. The 3-4,000 or so Irish dead were left lying on the field, unburied. Their precise fate is unknown but there is evidence they were used as fertiliser. While distasteful, this was not unusual; it is thought to have been the fate of the remains of the dead from the Battle of Waterloo (1815).

According to Dr Caleb Threlkeld, an 18th-century Dublin botanist, in 1714 he took specimens of moss growing on a dead man's skull from skulls brought in large butts from the Aughrim battlefield.

The battle site has not been preserved: a road, completed in 2009, was built through it.

Gerard Carrigan, Malvern, Worcs.