Girls’ Crochet Leggings No. 848 (1919): vintage crochet pattern

Materials

• Medium (CYC #4) wool yarn — the original was Utopia Scotch Knitting Yarn, 2 hanks of White
• Crochet hook (original: No. 4)
• Tapestry needle
• Hook: Start with 5 mm (US H-8); no gauge or measurement is printed, so swatch and fit the 53-st foundation around the child's ankle and foot

Abbreviations (US terms)

ch

chain

sc

single crochet

hdc

half double crochet

st

stitch

sts

stitches

row

row

inc

increase

dec

decrease

Notes before you start

• Source: "Girls’ Crochet Leggings No. 848" (No. 848), Utopia Yarn Book: Being a Practical Treatise on Knitting and Crocheting (Fourteenth Edition), Henry E. Frankenberg Co., New York, 1919. Public domain in the USA.
• As printed — materials: 2 hanks White Utopia Scotch Knitting Yarn.; 1 Crochet Hook, No. 4.. Gauge: Not given.
• Modernisation note: Stitches converted by the book's own definitions ("Explanation of Terms Used in Crocheting"), not by name: s. c. ("insert hook in ch. or st., draw the wool through, over, and draw through both loops on hook") = modern US sc; h. d. c. (over, insert, draw a loop through, over, draw through the three loops) = hdc; d. c. (over, insert, draw a loop through, over and through two loops twice) = dc; t. c. / treble crochet ("over twice", then through two loops three times) = tr; sl. st. (insert, over, draw through st and loop on hook) = sl st; ch. = ch; "over" = yo. For these stitches the 1919 American names already match modern US usage, so no stitch changes height.
• Modernisation note: Period abbreviations and wording modernised: s. c., h. d. c., d. c., t. c., sl. st., ch. written as sc, hdc, dc, tr, sl st, ch; "m." written as mesh; "st. of ch." written as "ch" where the stitch is a chain; "wool"/"thread" written as yarn; "needle" (used for the crochet hook) written as hook; "break off yarn" written as "fasten off"; "repeat" written as "rep"; ordinal row names ("Second Row", "Twenty-first Row") written as Row 2, Row 21.
• Modernisation note: Long printed paragraphs split into one row, round or step per line; stitch order and counts unchanged. Section headings added for navigation where the text runs on.
• Modernisation note: Hook numbers (bone, ivory, amber/celluloid No. 1–5) refer to the book's own illustrated scale of 1919 hooks, which pictures the hooks but prints no diameters, so no exact metric size can be read from the book. The suggested modern hook is a starting point chosen for the yarn weight.
• Modernisation note: No stitch gauge is printed anywhere in the book; work a swatch and match any printed measurements (in the modern gauge line) before starting.
• Modernisation note: Utopia yarns are 1919 trade names with no exact modern equivalent. The modern CYC weight given is an approximation only: Utopia Shetland Floss was a soft, fine, lofty 2-ply wool (treated here as fine, CYC #2); Utopia Alpaca and Llama wools, and the Worsted and Silk Mixture, as light (CYC #3); Utopia Germantown (zephyr) as light (CYC #3) and 8 Fold Germantown as medium (CYC #4); Scotch Knitting Yarn/Worsted as medium (CYC #4); 3 Fold Saxony as super fine (CYC #1). Yardage is never printed — the book gives skeins, balls or hanks only, and their weight is not stated.
• Modernisation note: "Make 2" added to the heading: the book gives the directions once for a pair of leggings.
• Modernisation note: "Thread in front of needle" written as "yarn in front of hook"; it is printed only in Row 26.
• Modernisation note: Check: "work 25 rows without turning" suggests the leggings are worked in the round (spiral) from Row 3, but the book calls them rows and gives no join or seam. Left as printed.
• Modernisation note: Check: the book prints "Twenty-sixth Row" straight after "work 25 rows", which counts Rows 1–2 inside the 25. The labels follow the printed numbers.
• Modernisation note: Check: "thread in front of needle" in Row 26 is not explained; it may describe how the hdc is started. Left as printed.
• Modernisation note: Check: the rows between Row 32 and Row 78 (12 + 10 + 4 + 19 = 45 rows) do not add up exactly to the printed Row 78. Left as printed.
• Modernisation note: Check: no strap, waistband, instep strap or seam is printed.