wash-leathers

At the far end a door was thrown open; a flush of light entered the chamber, and there came following it a troop of men wearing felt slippers and long linen aprons, and bearing upon their shoulders brooms, feather-heads, wash-leathers, brushes, dusters, steps, vacuum-cleaners, and other mysterious instruments of an uninterpretable form.

King John of Jingalo The Story of a Monarch in Difficulties Laurence Housman 1912

In the soft voice of my mistress it had always seemed to me to mean cream; now it seemed to mean kicks, blows, flapping dish-cloths, wash-leathers and dusters, pokers, carpet brooms, and every instrument of torture with which a poor cat could be chased from garret to cellar.

Brothers of Pity and Other Tales of Beasts and Men Juliana Horatia Gatty Ewing 1863