Old Photograph Drapers Shop Dumfries Scotland

Old photograph of the Colvin and Hodgson Drapers Shop in Dumfries, Scotland. Draper is the now largely obsolete term for a Scottish wholesaler, or especially retailer, of cloth, mainly for clothing. A would additionally operate as a cloth merchant or a haberdasher. The drapers were an important trade guild.

The surname Draper is of Old French origin, and is an occupational name for a maker or seller of woollen cloth, deriving from the Old French, word drapier. Early examples of the surname include: Robert le Drapier in Lincolnshire in 1181; Auwred le Draper in Cambridgeshire in 1273. Notable bearers of the name include: Sir Christopher Draper, Lord Mayor of London, England, in 1567; and Edward Alured Draper, born 1776, died 1841, page of honour to King George III. An early settler in the New World was Thomas Draper, aged 26, who embarked from London on the ship Paule bound for Virginia, America, in July 1635. The surname Draper is widely recorded in Ireland from the 17th Century, and its early connection with Ulster. The first recorded spelling of the family name is shown to be that of Hugo Drapier, which was dated 1148.



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