ENCLOSURE AND DEPOPULATION.
The very word “enclosure” to a historical student suggests
“depopulation.” The two words are almost treated as synonyms in Acts of
Parliament, tracts, and official documents of the sixteenth century.
In the seventeenth century we find the proverbs, “Horn and thorn shall
make England forlorn,” “Inclosures make fat beasts and lean poor
people,” while the superstition grew up that inclosed land was cursed,
and must within three generations pass away from the families of “these
madded and irreligious depopulators,” these “dispeoplers of towns,
ruiners of commonwealths, occasioners of beggary ... cruell inclosiers.”
After the Restoration, the literary attack on enclosure becomes more
feeble, the defence more powerful. W. Wales in 1781, the Rev. J.
Howlett in 1786, published statistics to show that enclosure had the
effect of increasing the population, the latter tract being widely
quoted; there ceased to be any opposition from the Central Government
to enclosure, and private Acts were passed in continually increasing
numbers; finally the one practical measure carried through by the Board
of Agriculture was the General Enclosure Act of 1801, to simplify
and cheapen Parliamentary proceedings. Dr. Cunningham sums up the
case as follows: “He (Joseph Massie) was aware that enclosing had
meant rural depopulation in the sixteenth century, and he too hastily
assumed that the enclosing which had been proceeding in the eighteenth
century was attended with similar results; but the conditions of the
time were entirely changed. Despite the reiterated allegation,[36]
it is impossible to believe that enclosing in the eighteenth century
implied either more pasture farming or less employment for labour.
The prohibition of export kept down the price of wool; the bounty on
exportation gave direct encouragement to corn-growing; the improved
agriculture gave more employment to labour than the old.”[37]
[36] By the opponents of enclosure.
[37] “Growth of English Industry and Commerce,” Vol. II., p. 384
(1892).
Taken in one sense, I must admit the substantial accuracy of this
opinion. On the other hand I am disposed to maintain the general
accuracy of the statements with regard to depopulation made by the
opponents of enclosure, (_a_) provided these statements are understood
in the sense in which they are meant, and (_b_) statements only with
regard to the part of the country the writer is familiar with are
regarded, and his inferences with regard to other parts are neglected.
For it must be remembered that side by side with the movement for the
enclosure of arable fields, there was going on a movement for the
enclosure of wastes. From Appendix A. it will be seen that 577 Acts for
enclosing wastes and common pastures were passed between 1702 and 1802,
and over 800,000 acres were so added to the cultivated area of England
and Wales. There were besides enclosures occasionally on a large scale
by landed proprietors of wastes on which either common rights were not
exercised, or on which they were too feebly maintained to necessitate
an Act. The Board of Agriculture report for Notts records that 10,666
acres had recently been so enclosed from Sherwood Forest alone.[38]
Lastly there was the continual pushing forward of cultivation by
farmers, squatters, etc. It is impossible to do more than form a vague
guess as to the quantity of land so enclosed, but reasons will be given
later for the belief that it was far greater than the area of commons
and waste enclosed by Act of Parliament.
[38] Robert Lowe, “Nottingham,” Appendix.
Now the opponents of enclosure of the sixteenth, seventeenth _and_
eighteenth centuries almost without exception opposed simply the
enclosure of arable common fields; they usually expressly approve
the enclosure of waste, as increasing the means of subsistence of
the people. The advocates of enclosure on the other hand are equally
concerned in advocating both kinds of enclosure. Hence we have
statements to the effect that the enclosure of arable fields in the
“champion” districts of England (_i.e._, the part much shaded on
the map) caused rural depopulation, met by statistics and arguments
to prove that all kinds of enclosure proceeding over all parts of
England and Wales, on the whole, tended to increase population,
urban and rural. Through looseness of wording on both sides, the
controversialists seem to be contradicting one another; whereas, in
reality, both might equally be right.
At the present day this particular issue is dead, though a similar
question, the question whether by means of the modern representative of
the open field, viz., the allotment field, and modern representative
of the ancient co-operative ploughing, viz., co-operative purchase of
machines, manures and seeds, borrowing of capital, sale of produce,
and perhaps co-operative stockbreeding, the decay of the agricultural
population can be arrested, is a living issue. Nor is there any period
of the nineteenth century in which any serious rural depopulation as a
result of enclosure, and consequent laying down in pasture, of common
fields, could be asserted. Since Free Trade began to seriously affect
the prices of British grain--and that was not for a good many years
after 1846--the common fields have been too few, and the other forces
tending towards rural depopulation too great, for this particular force
to be felt. And if it were felt, no one would seriously urge that the
hardly pressed farmer should be compelled to cultivate the land in
a manner wasteful of labour, in order that more labourers might be
employed. In the earlier part of the nineteenth century war, protection
and a rapidly growing wealth and population so effectively encouraged
tillage that attempted prohibition of conversion of arable to grass
would have been superfluous.
Yet much, I think, can be learnt on the historical question from the
present aspect of the country, even by anyone who merely travels by
express train through the Midlands. Having spent a day in traversing
the length and breadth of the great fields of Castor and Ailesworth,
yellow with wheat and barley or recently cut stubble, I went straight
through the county of Northamptonshire, seeing on either side scarcely
anything but permanent pasture. From Northampton to Leicester was the
same thing; again from Leicester to Uppingham. Just beyond Uppingham
the cornfields become far more extensive; what were the Rutlandshire
common fields till 1881 are still mainly under tillage. All this
country of permanent pasture was mainly enclosed during the eighteenth
century. Very frequently one can see on heavy land the old ridges piled
up in the middle, ending in the middle of one field, crossing hedges,
and showing plainly that very little, if any, ploughing has been done
since the enclosure was effected.[39] The impression made on my mind
by this apparent confirmation of all that the denouncers of “cruell
Inclosiers” alleged was a very powerful one.
[39] Arthur Young (“Eastern Tour,” Vol. I., p. 54) noticed this in
1771 in the great pasture closes of Northamptonshire: “All this fine
grass on so excellent a soil lies all in the broad ridge and furrow.”
Before examining the evidence for and against rural depopulation in
particular parts of England as the result of the extinction of common
fields, it is well to consider the _a priori_ arguments put forward by
Dr. Cunningham.
It is urged, in the first place, that owing to the relatively high
price of corn and low price of wool, there was no motive for lay-down
arable as pasture. Dr. Cunningham seems to ignore the fact that sheep
and cattle produce mutton, beef, milk, butter, cheese, and hides, as
well as wool, and it is by the profit to be derived from all of these
products together, and not from any one of them, that the question of
laying down in pasture will be determined. That laying down arable
in pasture was profitable is indicated by the surprise Arthur Young
expressed in 1768 that landlords did not enclose, and put the land
to grass, on passing through Bedfordshire,[40] and by Adam Smith’s
reference in “The Wealth of Nations” to the exceptional rent commanded
by enclosed pasture.[41] We have, further, the clear statement of the
Board of Agriculture: “Whereas the price of corn from 1760 to 1794
was almost stationary, the products of grass land have risen greatly
throughout nearly the whole of that period.”[42] William Pitt, again,
in a pamphlet published by the Board in 1812 on the “Food Produced from
Arable and Grass Land,” says that through the “increased luxury of the
times more beef and mutton and butter are used than formerly, even by
equal numbers, and consequently more inducement to throw all the best
corn to grass” (p. 35). William Culley adds in a footnote that “In the
Northern Counties more rent per acre is given for ploughing than for
grazing farms ... more rent is given for grazing than for arable farms
in the Southern Counties.” If this was so when famine prices were paid
for wheat, how much more in normal times?
[40] “Northern Tour,” 2nd. ed., p. 56.
[41] McCulloch’s ed., p. 69.
[42] “General Report on Enclosures,” p. 41.
It is said, in the second place, that “the new agriculture gave more
employment to labour than the old.” No doubt such an improvement as the
substitution of well-hoed turnips for a fallow, the sowing of grass
seeds with barley so as to produce a second crop, or feed for cattle
after the barley was carried, both gave increased employment to labour,
and tended to increased prosperity for the labouring as well as other
classes. But these changes, as we have seen, and as Dr. Cunningham
himself points out, might take place independently of enclosure, and
might not follow if enclosure did take place. Whether they usually did
follow upon enclosure is a question that has to be settled by an appeal
to contemporary evidence. In taking this evidence reference must always
be carefully made to the _time_ and the _place_.
The Board of Agriculture’s General Report on Enclosures (1808) quotes
with approval an anonymous pamphlet published in 1772: “The advantages
and disadvantages of enclosing waste lands and common fields,” by “A
Country Gentleman.” This tract appears to be a very able and impartial
attempt to estimate the effects of enclosure on all the classes
interested. The way in which Acts then originated, and the manner in
which proposals were received, is described thus:--
“The landowner, seeing the great increase of rent made by his
neighbour, conceives a desire of following his example; the village
is alarmed; the great farmer dreads an increase of rent, and being
constrained to a system of agriculture which neither his experience nor
his inclination tempt him into; the small farmer, that his farm will
be taken from him and consolidated with the larger; the cottager not
only expects to lose his commons, but the inheritable consequence of
the diminution of labour, the being obliged to quit his native place
in search of work; the inhabitants of the larger towns, a scarcity of
provisions; and the Kingdom in general, the loss of inhabitants” (p. 1).
The general conclusion seems to be that all these anticipations and
fears, with the exception of the last two--a scarcity of provisions for
large towns, and a general loss of inhabitants for the kingdom, are
well founded. With regard to the landowner and tithe-owner:--
“There can be no dispute that it is the landowners’ interest to promote
inclosures; but I verily believe, the improprietor of tithes reaps
the greatest proportional benefit, whilst the small freeholder, from
his expenses increasing inversely to the smallness of his allotment,
undoubtedly receives the least” (p. 25).[43]
[43] This is badly expressed. He refers to the fact that a small
allotment is more expensive to fence, proportionally to its size, than
a large one.
Of the small farmer:--“Indeed I doubt it is too true, he must of
necessity give over farming, and betake himself to labour for the
support of his family” (p. 31).
With regard to the increase or diminution of employment for labourers,
he gives the following statistical table, an estimate based on his
observation:--
┌───────────────────────────┬──────────────────┬─────────────────┐
│ │ Before Enclosure │ After Enclosure │
│ 1,000 Acres of │ gives │ gives │
│ │ Employment to │ Employment to │
├───────────────────────────┼──────────────────┼─────────────────┤
│ A Rich Arable Land │ 20 families │ 5 families │
│ B Inferior Arable │ 20 ″ │ 16¼ ″ │
│ C Stinted Common Pastures │ ½ a family │ 5 ″ │
│ D Heaths, Wastes, etc. │ ½ ″ │ 16¼ ″ │
└───────────────────────────┴──────────────────┴─────────────────┘
It will be seen that his observation is that enclosed arable employs
16¼ families per 1000 acres, open field arable 20 families per 1000
acres; that common pastures, heaths, wastes, etc., employ only 1 family
per 2000 acres; but enclosed pasture employs 5 families per 1000 acres.
It will also be seen that his observation is that after enclosure rich
land becomes pasture, inferior land arable.[44]
[44] This is in harmony with all other eighteenth century information
with regard to the Midland Counties. As one example we may cite the
Vale of Belvoir, the north-eastern corner of Leicestershire. Here, in
consequence of enclosure, “all the richest land in the vale, formerly
under tillage, was laid down in grass, but the skirtings of the Vale,
formerly sheep-walk, were brought into tillage.” The landlord, the
Duke of Rutland, forbade any land worth more than a guinea per acre to
be tilled. The enclosure of the twelve parishes in the Vale took place
between 1766 and 1792. (William Pitt, “Agriculture of Leicestershire,”
1809.)
With regard to the effect of this on population, he names in one
passage[45] Northamptonshire, Leicestershire and Lincolnshire perhaps,
as containing “an infinitely greater proportion of common fields, while
Northumberland, Westmoreland and Yorkshire exceed in moors, heaths
and commons,” and in another he mentions Oxfordshire, Buckingham,
Northamptonshire and part of Leicester as counties in which rich arable
land would be the main subject of an Enclosure Act. A typical parish
in this district might include 1000 acres of rich arable land, 500
acres of inferior arable, 500 acres of stinted common, with no heath or
waste. Before enclosure it would provide employment for 30¼ labouring
families according to the table, after enclosure to 15⅝. If eight such
parishes were enclosed, 117 families would be sent adrift--families
of poor and ignorant labourers, looking for new homes under all the
disabilities and difficulties springing from Acts of Settlement, and a
Poor Law administration based on the assumption that those who wander
from their native place are all that is implied in the words “vagrants”
and “vagabonds.” Not eight, but a hundred and twenty-six Acts for
enclosing common fields were passed for the four counties he names in
the ten years 1762–1772, immediately preceding the publication of this
pamphlet. Assuming the accuracy of the “Country Gentleman’s” statement,
this would mean that some 1800 odd families, comprising about 9000
individuals, would, in consequence of enclosure, be sent adrift in that
short period in the four counties. The quotations given below from
three other authors, indicate that even this was an under-statement.
The process continued without intermission for many years afterwards.
[45] Page 43.
A specially interesting tract, published in 1786, entitled “Thoughts
on Inclosures, by a Country Farmer,” gives a detailed account of the
results of one case of enclosure. The locality is not named, but it is
pretty clear that it was within this Midland country in which enclosure
was attended by the conversion of arable to pasture.
On the general question the writer says:--“To obtain an Act of
Parliament to inclose a common field, two witnesses are produced, to
swear that the lands thereof, in their present state, are not worth
occupying, though at the same time they are lands of the best soil in
the kingdom, and produce corn in the greatest abundance, and of the
best quality. And by inclosing such lands, they are generally prevented
from producing any corn at all, as the landowner converts twenty small
farms into about four large ones, and at the same time the tenants
of those large farms are tied down in their leases not to plough any
of the premises, so lett to farm,[46] by which means of several hundred
villages, that forty years ago contained between four and five hundred
inhabitants, very few will now be found to exceed eighty, and some not
half that number; nay some contain only one poor decripid man or woman,
housed by the occupiers of lands who live in another parish, to prevent
them being obliged to pay towards the support of the poor who live in
the next parish” (p. 2).
The profit of enclosing, he maintains, was dependent upon simultaneous
conversion into pasture, for “In some places the lands inclosed do
not answer the ends of pasturage, and in that case tillage is still to
be pursued; because the rents cannot be raised so high as in respect
of pasturage, therefore the landowner has not the advantage as in case
the land turns out fit for pasturage, and is oftener the loser by that
proceeding than the gainer.”[46]
[46] Arthur Young (“Eastern Tour,” 1771, p. 96) remarks that in
Leicestershire “Landlords in general will not allow an inch to be
ploughed on grazing farms.”
The particular enclosure he cites is that of a parish enclosed about
forty years previously. Before enclosure it contained eighty-two
houses, of which twenty were small farms and forty-two were cottages
with common rights. It had 1800 acres of common field arable, 200
acres of rich common cow pasture, and 200 acres of meadow, commonable
after hay harvest. The common pasture fed two hundred milch cows and
sixty dry ones till hay harvest, at which time they were turned into
the meadows, and their place taken by about one hundred horses. Twelve
hundred sheep were fed on the stubbles.
The gross produce of the parish before enclosure he values as follows:--
£ _s. d._
1,100 quarters of wheat at 28_s._ per quarter 1,540 0 0
1,200 quarters of barley at 16_s._ per quarter 960 0 0
900 quarters of beans at 15_s._ per quarter 675 0 0
250 todds of wool at 16_s._ per todd 200 0 0
600 lambs at 10_s._ each 300 0 0
5,000 lbs. of cheese at 1½_d._ per lb. 31 5 0
6,000 lbs. of butter at 5_d._ per lb. 125 0 0
100 calves at 20_s._ each 100 0 0
150 pigs at 12_s._ each 90 0 0
Poultry and eggs 80 0 0
───────────
£4,101 5 0
═══════════
The quantities estimated are eminently reasonable, and in harmony with
other statements available with regard to the produce of the common
fields of the Midlands; the prices also are clearly not over-stated.
As the result of enclosure the twenty farms were consolidated into
four, the whole area was devoted to grazing, sixty cottages were pulled
down or otherwise disappeared, and the necessary work was done by four
herds (one for each farm) at £25 a year each, board included, and eight
maidservants at £18 a year each, board included.
The gross produce of the parish after enclosure was:--
£ _s. d._
Fat beasts 960 0 0
Sheep and lambs 760 0 0
Calves 165 0 0
Wool 235 0 0
Butter 190 0 0
Cheese 100 0 0
Horses 250 0 0
───────────
£2,660 0 0
═══════════
But while the gross produce was thus reduced by about one-third, the
gross rent was raised from £1137 17_s._ 0_d._ to £1801 12_s._ 2_d._[47]
[47] According to the “Country Gentleman’s” calculations, the gross
produce of the 1800 acres of common field and 200 acres of common
pasture would be before enclosure £1419 8_s._, and after, £3000,
which agrees very closely with the “Country Farmer’s” statement, the
absolute amounts being greater, the ratio between them practically
identical.
Though unfortunately the parish is not identified, and the witness
is anonymous, the whole statement appears to have been carefully and
exactly made. In this case we have no fewer than sixty families of
small farmers or agricultural labourers expelled from their homes in a
single parish of about 2300 acres.
An even more striking example of local depopulation caused by enclosure
is supplied by the Rev. John Howlett, one of the strongest advocates of
enclosure. He quotes from a private correspondent: “As to Inclosure,
I can mention two villages in this County (Leicestershire) within two
miles of each other, Wistow and Foston,[48] which formerly contained
thirty-four or thirty-five dwellings, but by enclosure Foston is
reduced to three habitations: the parsonage house accommodates one
family, and the two other buildings are occupied by shepherds, who
manage the stock for their different renters, as the whole of the
parish belongs to one person. And as to Wistow, the thirty-four
mansions have vanished in a very few years, and no dwelling remains
but the late Sir Charles Halford’s hall house, who owns the lordship;
and these are called improvements, for double or treble rents ensue.”
(“Enclosures and Depopulation,” p. 12.)
[48] Each of these was enclosed without an Act of Parliament.
What became of these farmers and labourers? The “Country Farmer” says:
“Many of the small farmers who have been deprived of their livelihood
have sold their stock-in-trade and have raised from £50 to £100, with
which they have procured themselves, their families, and money, a
passage to America.”
John Wedge, the Board of Agriculture reporter for Warwick, says seven
years later: “About forty years ago the southern and eastern parts of
this county consisted mostly of open fields. There are still about
50,000 acres of open field land, which in a few years will probably
all be inclosed.... These lands being now grazed want much fewer
hands to manage them than they did in the former open state. Upon all
enclosures of open fields the farms have generally been made much
larger; from these causes the hardy yeomanry of country villages
have been driven for employment to Birmingham, Coventry, and other
manufacturing towns.”[49] Such information, given by the representative
of an enclosure-advocating corporation, circulated among the members
for correction before final adoption, is unimpeachable evidence for the
particular time and place.
[49] John Wedge, “Warwickshire” p. 40 (1793).
The rising industries of Birmingham and other Midland towns found
employment, no doubt, for many of the exiles from the villages. On
the whole, the ruling opinion seems to have found all this very
satisfactory. The gross produce of food by these Midland parishes
might be diminished on enclosure, but the net produce, as was shown
by the increase of rent, certainly increased, and an abundant supply
of labour was furnished for those metal working industries which were
of the greatest importance in times of war.[50] When we think of the
horrible sanitary conditions of English towns during the eighteenth
century, of Fielding’s description of the London lodging-houses, of
Colquhoun’s attempts at a statistical account of London thieves, of
Hogarth’s pictures, which interpret for us the meaning of the terrible
fact that right through the eighteenth century the deaths “within the
bills of mortality” regularly far exceeded the births, we feel that
there was another side to the shield, though possibly the sanitary and
social condition of Midland towns was less terrible than that of London.
[50] 1756–1763, 1775–1784, 1792–1815 were times of war.
The connection between enclosure of common fields and rising poor
rates in the eighteenth century is illustrated repeatedly in Eden’s
“Condition of the Poor.”
In Buckinghamshire we find the two neighbouring parishes of Maids
Morton and Winslow. The former contained 30 acres of old enclosure, 60
to 70 acres of commons, and the rest of the parish, about 800 acres,
was common field. The poor-rates in the years 1792 to 1795 were 3_s._
6_d._, 3_s._, 3_s._, 3_s._ 6_d._ There were “several roundsmen.” Wages
were nominally 1_s._ to 1_s._ 2_d._ per day, but piecework was general,
and 1_s._ 3_d._ to 1_s._ 6_d._ was generally earned. The rent of farms
varied from £17 to £90 per farm, and from 18_s._ to 20_s._ per acre.
Winslow contained 1400 acres, and was entirely enclosed in 1744 and
1766. Only 200 acres remained arable. The farms varied from £60 to
£400 per annum each, the wages were 6_s._ to 7_s._ per week, “most of
the labourers are on rounds,” and the poor rates from 1792 to 1795
were 5_s._ 8_d._, 4_s._, 5_s._, and 6_s._ “The rise of the Rates is
chiefly ascribed to the Enclosure of common fields; which it is said
has lessened the number of farms, and from the conversion of arable
into pasture, has much reduced the demand for labourers. An old man of
the parish says, before the enclosures took place, land did not let for
10_s._ per acre.” (Vol. II., pp. 27–33.)
In judging the rise of poor rate, it must not be forgotten that where
the rent rises at the same time as the nominal rate, the sum of money
actually raised for Poor Law purposes is increased in a greater ratio
than the nominal poor rate. If, for example, by enclosure the rental
of a parish is increased 50 per cent., but the poor rate doubled, the
yield of the poor rate is increased threefold. And if a considerable
number of labourers are driven elsewhere, the amount of destitution
produced by the change is far greater even than that indicated by a
threefold increase in the amount of relief given.
The latter side of the process is illustrated in the case of Deddington
in Oxfordshire. Here, “the high rates in this parish are ascribed to
the common field of which the land principally consists; whereas the
neighbouring parishes have been enclosed many years, and many small
farms in them have been consolidated; so that many small farmers
with little capitals have been obliged, either to turn labourers or
to procure small farms in Deddington, or other parishes that possess
common fields. Besides this, the neighbouring parishes are, many of
them, possessed by a few individuals, who are cautious in permitting
new comers to obtain a settlement.” (Vol. II., p. 891.)
In Leicestershire the complaint is naturally more loud and general. In
the account of Kibworth Beauchamp we read as follows:--
“No account of the Rates in any of the divisions, previous to the
enclosure of the common fields, can be obtained; but it is said that
they were not one-third of what they are at present; and the people
attribute the rise to the enclosures; for they say ‘That before the
fields were enclosed, they were solely applied to the production of
corn; that the poor had then plenty of employment in weeding, reaping,
threshing, etc., and could also collect a great quantity of corn by
gleaning; but that the fields being now in pasturage, the farmers have
little occasion for labourers, and the poor being thereby thrown out
of employment, must of course be employed by the parish.’ There is
some truth in these observations: _one-third or perhaps one-fourth_ of
the number of hands which were required twenty years ago, would now be
sufficient, according to the present system of agriculture, to perform
all the farming work of the parish.”
He adds that if it were not for the fact that many labourers were
getting employment in canal cutting, the rates would be much higher
still, and “the tradesmen, small farmers, and labourers are very loud
in their complaints against those whom they call monopolising farmers
and graziers, an evil which, they say, increases every year.” (Vol.
II., p. 383.)
In Northamptonshire we find the case of Brixworth, enclosed in 1780,
a parish of 3300 acres. Before enclosure it consisted almost entirely
of common fields. At the time of Eden’s writing, sixteen years
later, only one-third remained arable. The expenditure on the poor
in 1776, before the enclosure, was £121 6_s._, in the six years 1787
to 1792 it averaged £325 (Vol. II., p. 529). Again, with regard to local
urban opinion, he notes that “the lands round Kettering are chiefly
open field: they produce rich crops of corn. The people of the town
seem averse to enclosures, which they think will raise the price
of provisions, from these lands being all turned to pasture, when
inclosed, as was the case in Leicestershire, which was a great corn
country, and is now, almost entirely, converted into pasture.”
Arthur Young, a little more than twenty years previously (in “Political
Arithmetic,” published in 1774), while arguing in favour of enclosure
on the depopulation count, makes an admission against it with regard
to pauperism. “Very many of the labouring poor have become chargeable
to their parishes, but this has nothing to do with depopulation; on
the contrary, the constantly seeing such vast sums distributed in this
way, must be an inducement to marriage among all the idle poor--and
certainly has proved so.” (Pp. 75, 76.)
As a general rule it may be said that where after enclosure pasturage
was increased at the expense of tillage, rural depopulation resulted;
where the amount of land under tillage was increased the rural
population increased. Further, that enclosure in the northern and
western parts of England in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries
increased the area under tillage; that the balance between the
production of bread and meat for the whole country, so disturbed, was
maintained by the conversion into pasture, on enclosure, of much of the
“champion” corn growing land, particularly in those midland counties
nearest to the northern and western ones in which the complementary
change was taking place. By means of the Enclosure Acts, interpreted by
the light of the above statements, we can trace these two compensating
movements through the eighteenth century.
The following passage in Arthur Young’s “Political Arithmetic,”
published in 1774, at the time, that is, when he was an eager advocate
not only of enclosure of all sorts, but also of the engrossing of farms
and the raising of rents, sums up the two movements:--
“The fact is this: in the central counties of the kingdom,
particularly Northamptonshire, Leicestershire, and parts of Warwick,
Huntingdonshire, and Buckinghamshire, there have been within thirty
years large tracts of the open field arable under that vile course,
1. fallow, 2. wheat, 3. spring corn, inclosed and laid down to grass,
being much more suited to the wetness of the soil than corn.” Here
he admits local depopulation takes place, though he claims that a
greater _net_ produce is, as the result of enclosure, supplied by
such districts to the rest of the kingdom. But then, he asks with
regard to the opponents of such enclosure, “What will they say to the
inclosures in _Norfolk_, _Suffolk_, _Nottinghamshire_, _Derbyshire_,
_Lincolnshire_, _Yorkshire_ and all the northern counties? What say
they to the sands of _Norfolk, Suffolk and Nottinghamshire_, which
yield corn and mutton from _the force of INCLOSURE alone_? What say
they to the Wolds of _York_ and _Lincoln_, which from barren heaths at
1_s._ per acre, are _by INCLOSURE alone_ rendered profitable farms?
Ask _Sir Cecil Wray_ if without Inclosure he could advance his heaths
by sainfoine from 1_s._ to 20_s._ an acre:--What say they to the vast
tracts in the peak of Derby which _by INCLOSURE alone_ are changed
from black regions of ling to fertile fields covered with cattle? What
say they to the improvements of moors in the northern counties, where
INCLOSURES alone have made these countries smile with culture which
before were black as night?”
He then proceeds to ridicule the view of his opponents, that the
enclosure of waste, though desirable in itself, should as far as
possible be so conducted as to create small farms and small properties,
a view with which in later years, and after his tour in France, he very
much sympathised. Into the merits of this controversy we need not go;
what we have to note here is Arthur Young’s evidence to the fact that
from about 1744 to 1774 there was simultaneously proceeding a rapid
enclosure of waste in Norfolk, Suffolk, Nottinghamshire, Derbyshire,
Yorkshire, and Lincolnshire and the northern counties, by which
the acreage under tillage was vastly increased, and a compensating
enclosure of arable common fields in Northamptonshire, Leicestershire,
Warwickshire, Huntingdonshire and Buckinghamshire, involving the
conversion of arable to pasture, of small farms into much larger ones,
and of the peasantry into urban labourers.
It only remains to be added that the former movement, if it was on
at all as great a scale as Arthur Young gives us to understand (and
I don’t see why one should doubt this) must have proceeded largely,
if not mainly, without the intervention of Parliament. This is in the
first place antecedently probable. Secondly, whereas between 1727
and 1774 there were 273 common field parishes enclosed by Acts of
Parliament in the five counties of Northamptonshire, Leicestershire,
Warwick, Huntingdonshire and Buckinghamshire, the commons, fens,
moors, etc., attached to only 109 parishes in Norfolk, Suffolk,
Nottinghamshire, Derbyshire, Lincolnshire, Yorkshire, Durham and
Northumberland were so enclosed. Unless the area of about 100,000 acres
thus enclosed in these 109 parishes was merely a fraction of the total
area of waste enclosed by all sorts of methods in this latter group of
counties, Arthur Young was misleading his readers, for he certainly
intends to give the impression that the enclosure of arable fields
in the Midlands was on a much smaller scale than the reclamation of
heaths, moors and fens in the northern and eastern counties. Thirdly,
with regard to Norfolk, Arthur Young specifies enclosure without
Acts of Parliament as one of the causes of the great agricultural
improvement in parts of Norfolk (“Eastern Tour,” 1771, Vol. II., p.
150):--“From forty to sixty years ago, all the Northern and Western and
a great part of the Eastern tracts of the country were sheep-walks, let
so low as from 6_d._ to 1_s._ 6_d._ and 2_s._ an acre. Much of it was
in this condition only thirty years ago. The great improvements have
been made by reason of the following circumstances:--(1) By inclosing
without assistance of Parliament.”
Six other reasons follow, then the remark: “Parliamentary enclosures
are scarcely ever so complete and general as in Norfolk,” _i.e._, as
the enclosures without the assistance of Parliament in Norfolk. I have
only been able to find eleven Acts of Enclosure for Norfolk before
1771; seven of these were for the enclosure of common field parishes,
and four for the enclosure of waste. In other words, the Parliamentary
enclosure of these sheep-walks at the time when Arthur Young wrote had
proceeded to a merely trifling extent.
We have, then, by Arthur Young’s confession, in the five counties of
Northampton, Leicester, Warwick, Huntingdon, and Buckingham enclosure
admittedly accompanied by decay of tillage and rural depopulation.
From “A Country Gentleman’s” list we can add Oxfordshire and parts of
Lincolnshire. That the same prevailing economic motive operated in
Bedfordshire can be shown from Arthur Young’s “Tour through the North
of England.” The country in June, 1768, from St. Neots to Kimbolton
was in general open--“the open fields let at 7_s._ and 7_s._ 6_d._ per
acre, and the _inclosed pastures_ about 17_s._ Hence we find a profit
of 10_s._ an acre _by inclosing and laying to grass_.” He might here
ask, as he does with regard to the district in Buckinghamshire between
Aylesbury and Buckingham, which he found in 1771 in the condition of
open field arable, under a course of fallow, wheat, beans, fallow,
barley, beans. “As to the landlords, what in the name of wonder can
be the reason of their not inclosing! All this vale would make as fine
meadows as any in the world.”
As for Gloucestershire, William Marshall (“Rural Economy of
Gloucestershire,” 1789, p. 21), estimates the rents in the Vale of
Evesham at 10_s._ to 15_s._ per acre for common field arable, 10_s._
to 20_s._ per acre for enclosed arable, and 20_s._ to 50_s._ per acre
for enclosed pasture. Here again there can be no doubt that enclosure
implied laying down at least all the good land in grass.
A Select Committee of the House of Commons appointed to consider the
high prices of food in December, 1800 (1800 and 1801 being famine
years), made enquiry, by the help of the parish clergy, into the
increase or decrease of land under different crops, and of cattle,
sheep, and pigs in the districts which had been enclosed in the
previous 45 years by private Acts (_i.e._, since 1755). The total
result showed a net gain in area under wheat in 1,767,651 acres
enclosed of 10,625 acres; the area under wheat being before enclosure
155,572 acres; after, 165,837 acres. But these figures included all
sorts of enclosure. The Board of Agriculture (“Gen. Report,” pp. 39 and
232), by leaving out cases where waste only was enclosed, obtained the
following result for cases of enclosure of all commonable lands, under
Acts passed between 1761 and 1799, in parishes where commonable arable
was included. Taking the counties in groups we have:--
┌────────────────────┬───────────────────────┬───────────────────────┐
│ │ Wheat Acreage │ Wheat Acreage │
│ │ Increased │ Decreased │
│ ---- ├───────────┬───────────┼───────────┬───────────┤
│ │ in Cases. │ by Acres. │ in Cases. │ by Acres. │
├────────────────────┼───────────┼───────────┼───────────┼───────────┤
│ MIDLAND COUNTIES. │ │ │ │ │
│ │ │ │ │ │
│ Rutland │ 0 │ -- │ 10 │ 596 │
│ Warwick │ 2 │ 93 │ 30 │ 2,871 │
│ Leicester │ 11 │ 453 │ 63 │ 4,340 │
│ Northampton │ 11 │ 450 │ 75 │ 7,016 │
│ Nottingham │ 14 │ 923 │ 28 │ 1,823 │
│ Oxford │ 8 │ 285 │ 11 │ 508 │
│ Buckingham │ 6 │ 161 │ 32 │ 3,085 │
│ Bedford │ 7 │ 668 │ 23 │ 1,801 │
│ ├───────────┼───────────┼───────────┼───────────┤
│ Total │ 59 │ 3033 │ 262 │ 22,036 │
│ ╞═══════════╪═══════════╪═══════════╪═══════════╡
│ │ │ │ │ │
│ EASTERN COUNTIES. │ │ │ │ │
│ │ │ │ │ │
│ Norfolk │ 8 │ 627 │ 1 │ 10 │
│ Suffolk │ 3 │ 150 │ 0 │ │
│ Huntingdon │ 7 │ 469 │ 9 │ 530 │
│ Cambridge │ 7 │ 895 │ 2 │ 184 │
│ Essex │ 1 │ 40 │ 0 │ │
│ Hertford │ 3 │ 174 │ 1 │ 7 │
│ ├───────────┼───────────┼───────────┼───────────┤
│ Total │ 29 │ 2,355 │ 13 │ 731 │
│ ╞═══════════╪═══════════╪═══════════╪═══════════╡
│ │ │ │ │ │
│ NORTHERN COUNTIES. │ │ │ │ │
│ │ │ │ │ │
│ Northumberland │ 2 │ 80 │ 1 │ 93 │
│ Durham │ 1 │ 20 │ 2 │ 172 │
│ Yorkshire │ 40 │ 3,411 │ 22 │ 1,991 │
│ Lincoln │ 48 │ 2,422 │ 41 │ 2,843 │
│ Derby │ 3 │ 60 │ 10 │ 345 │
│ ├───────────┼───────────┼───────────┼───────────┤
│ Total │ 94 │ 5,993 │ 76 │ 5,444 │
│ ╞═══════════╪═══════════╪═══════════╪═══════════╡
│ │ │ │ │ │
│ SOUTHERN COUNTIES. │ │ │ │ │
│ (South of Thames). │ │ │ │ │
│ │ │ │ │ │
│ Berkshire │ 5 │ 312 │ 3 │ 249 │
│ Wiltshire │ 12 │ 884 │ 11 │ 528 │
│ Hampshire │ 6 │ 256 │ 2 │ 90 │
│ Dorset │ 4 │ 105 │ 5 │ 177 │
│ Somerset │ 1 │ 50 │ 1 │ 33 │
│ Sussex │ 1 │ 180 │ 0 │ │
│ ├───────────┼───────────┼───────────┼───────────┤
│ Total │ 29 │ 1,787 │ 22 │ 1,077 │
│ ╞═══════════╪═══════════╪═══════════╪═══════════╡
│ │ │ │ │ │
│ WESTERN COUNTIES. │ │ │ │ │
│ │ │ │ │ │
│ Gloucester │ 17 │ 948 │ 20 │ 988 │
│ Hereford │ 1 │ 40 │ │ │
│ Shropshire │ 2 │ 115 │ │ │
│ Staffordshire │ -- │ -- │ 1 │ 300 │
│ Worcester │ 9 │ 345 │ 3 │ 155 │
├────────────────────┼───────────┼───────────┼───────────┼───────────┤
│ Total │ 29 │ 1,448 │ 24 │ 1,343 │
│ ╞═══════════╪═══════════╪═══════════╪═══════════╡
│ GRAND TOTAL │ 239 │ 14,507 │ 407 │ 30,894 │
│ ╘═══════════╧═══════════╧═══════════╧═══════════╡
└────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┘
In estimating the significance of these figures it must be borne
in mind that the figures for acreage in wheat after enclosure were
collected at a time of famine prices for wheat. Probably many thousands
of acres of old arable common field, which had been enclosed and laid
down in grass, in each of these counties, were again ploughed under the
stimulus of wheat prices exceeding 100_s._ per quarter.
So much with regard to the connexion between depopulation and enclosure
in the second half of the eighteenth century. With regard to the first
half, the following account is supplied by a certain John Cowper,
“Inclosing Commons and Common field lands is contrary to the interest
of the Nation” (1732):--
“When these commons come to be inclosed and converted into pasture, the
Ruin of the Poor is a natural consequence; they being bought out by the
lord of the _Manor_, or some other person of substance.
“In most open field parishes there are at a medium 40 farmers and 80
cottagers who hold their lands in common, and have right of commonage
one with another. Suppose each person employs 6 labourers, we have in
all 660 persons, men, women and children, who besides their Employment
in Husbandry, carry on large branches of the Woollen and Linnen
Manufactures.”
With regard to the plea that hedging and ditching will employ many
hands, he says: “This is so contrary to constant experience, that it
hardly deserves to be taken notice of. I myself, within these 30 years
past, have seen above 20 Lordships or Parishes inclosed, and everyone
of them has been in a manner depopulated. If we take all the inclosed
Parishes one with another, we shall find hardly ten inhabitants
remaining, where there were an hundred before Inclosures were made.
And in some parishes 120 families of Farmers and Cottagers, have in a
few years been reduced to four, to two, aye, and sometimes to but one
family. And if this practice of inclosing continues much longer, we may
expect to see all the great estates ingrossed by a few Hands, and the
industrious Farmers and Cottagers almost intirely rooted out of the
kingdom. Raising Hedges and sinking ditches may indeed employ several
hands for a year, or hardly so long, but when that is once over, the
work is at an end.... Owners of inclosed Lands, if they have but a
little corn to get in, are already forced to send several miles to open
field parishes for Harvest men.”
Six open field farms, averaging 150 acres each, and the little holdings
of twelve cottagers, would be let together, after enclosure, as one
grazing farm, and the total rent thus be raised from £300 to £600.
But whereas one acre of arable land would previously have produced 20
bushels at 3_s._ per bushel, a gross return of £3; after enclosure it
would contribute to the fattening of a bullock to the extent of 25_s._
The gross produce is decreased; but the net produce is increased. Of
the £3 produced by the acre of common field under wheat, 50_s._ would
go in expenses, leaving 6_s._ 8_d._ to the landlord and 3_s._ 4_d._
to the tenant. Of the 25_s._ produced by the same acre enclosed under
grass, 13_s._ 4_d._ would go to the landlord, 11_s._ 8_d._ to the
grazier.
It is interesting in passing to note the association of common field
agriculture with manufacture in the domestic stage indicated by this
passage.
We have also direct evidence of the same movements in the seventeenth
century. On the one hand Walter Blyth (“The English Improver,” 1649,
p. 40) has the passage:--“Consider but the Woodlands, who before
Enclosure, were wont to be relieved by the Fieldon, with corne of all
sorts. And now growne as gallant Corne Countries as be in England,
as the Western part of Warwickshire, and the northern parts of
Worcestershire, Staffordshire, Shropshire, Derbyshire, Yorkshire, and
all the countries thereabouts.” On the other hand, from the controversy
between the two John Moores on the one hand, and Joseph Lee and an
anonymous controversialist on the other, we can pick out certain
statements of matters of fact that passed uncontradicted.
This controversy arose out of the enclosure of Catthorp, a parish
in the extreme south-west corner of Leicestershire, bordering on
Northamptonshire and Warwickshire. Lee was the parish priest of
Catthorp, and a party to the enclosure. In his “Vindication of
Regulated Inclosure,” he gives a list of fifteen parishes within three
miles of Catthorp which had been enclosed. He also gives a list of
nineteen parishes, enclosed from twenty to fifty years, in which
depopulation had not yet taken place. This second list, as John Moore
remarks, “they were forced to fish up out of the counties of Leicester,
Warwick, Northampton, etc.,” and it is significant that two only of
the fifteen parishes enclosed near Catthorp are asserted by Lee not to
have been attended by depopulation. If we go a little earlier we find
in 1607 an insurrection against enclosures, followed by a searching
enquiry by James I.’s government, and no doubt by renewed vigilance,
for a while, in the enforcement of the Depopulation Acts. It may be
regarded as axiomatic that in a corn-growing country,[51] enclosure
which does not diminish tillage, does not provoke riot and insurrection.
[51] Riots may occur on the enclosure of waste, where the enclosed
waste gave a livelihood to a considerable specialised population,
as in Hatfield Chase and the Fens. See Dr. Cunningham’s “Growth of
English Industry and Commerce,” Vol. II., pp. 187, 188.
While, however, enclosure which does not diminish the land under
tillage does not, as a rule, cause rural depopulation, it is a rule
not altogether without exception. One of the most striking passages in
Cobbett’s “Rural Rides” is that written in August, 1826, in which he
describes the valley of the Wiltshire Avon:--
“It is manifest enough, that the population of this valley was, at
one time, many times over what it is now; for, in the first place,
what were the twenty-nine churches built for? The population of the
twenty-nine parishes is now but little more than one-half of the
single parish of Kensington,[52] and there are several of the churches
bigger than the church at Kensington.... In three instances, Fifield,
Milston, and Roach-Fen, the _church porches_ would hold all the
inhabitants, even down to the bedridden and the babies. What then,
will any man believe that these churches were built for such little
knots of people?... But, in fact, you plainly see all the traces of
a great ancient population. The churches were almost all large, and
built in the best manner. Many of them are very fine edifices; very
costly in the building; and, in the cases where the body of the church
has been altered in the repairing of it, so as to make it smaller, the
tower, which everywhere defies the hostility of time, shows you what
the church must formerly have been.... There are now no less than nine
of the parishes out of the twenty-nine, that have either no parsonage
houses or have such as are in such a state that a parson will not,
or cannot, live in them.... The land remains, and the crops and the
sheep come as abundantly as ever; but they are now sent almost wholly
away.... In the distance of about thirty miles, there stood fifty
mansion houses. Where are they now? I believe there are but eight,
that are at all worthy of the name of mansion houses.... In taking my
leave of this beautiful vale I have to express my deep shame, as an
Englishman, at beholding the general extreme poverty of those who cause
this vale to produce such quantities of food and raiment. This is, I
verily believe it, the worst-used labouring population upon the face of
the earth.”[53]
[52] Just above he states it at 9,116.
[53] “Rural Rides,” 1830 edition, pp. 375–390.
When Cobbett wrote, the process of Enclosure for this corner of
Wiltshire was practically complete. Thomas Davis, whose account of the
agriculture of Wiltshire is the most interesting of the whole series
of county surveys, wrote when the process was in its early stage, and
wrote predicting depopulation. He says, “The greater part of this
country was formerly, and at no very remote period, in the hands of
great proprietors. Almost every manor had its resident lord, who held
part of the lands in demesne, and granted out the rest by copy or
lease to under tenants, usually for three lives renewable. A state of
commonage, and particularly of open common fields, was particularly
favourable to this tenure.... The north-west of Wiltshire being much
better adapted to inclosures and to sub-division of property, than the
rest, was inclosed first; while the south-east, or Down district, has
undergone few inclosures and still fewer sub-divisions.”[54]
[54] Thos. Davis, Wiltshire, p. 8.
The common field system was called “tenantry.”[55] The tenants
ordinarily were occupiers of single “yardlands,” rented at about £20
a year each. A typical yardland consisted,[56] besides the homestead,
of 2 acres of meadow, 18 acres in the arable fields, usually in 18 to
20 pieces, a right on the common meadows, common fields, and downs
for forty sheep, and as many cattle as the tenant could winter with
the fodder he grew.[57] His forty sheep were kept with those of his
neighbours, in the common flock of the manor, in charge of the common
shepherd. They were taken every day to the downs, and brought back
every night to be folded on the arable fields, the usual rule being
to fold one thousand sheep on a “tenantry” acre (but ¾ of a statute
acre) per night. In breeding sheep regard was had to what may be termed
folding quality (_i.e._, the propensity to drop manure only after being
folded at night) as much as to quality or quantity of wool or meat.[58]
[55] _Ibid._, p. 14.
[56] Contrast with such farms those described by Cobbett 30 years
later: “At one farm 27 ricks, at another 400 acres of wheat stubble in
one piece, at a third a sheepfold about 4,000 sheep and lambs, at a
fourth 300 hogs in one stubble, a fifth farm at Milton had 600 qrs. of
wheat, 1,200 qrs. of barley of the year’s crop, and kept on an average
1,400 sheep” (pp. 363, 4, 5). “The farms are all large” (p. 361).
[57] _Ibid._, p. 15.
[58] _Ibid._, p. 61.
On the enclosure of such a manor the common flock was broken up, and
the position of the small farmer became untenable. It is true, says our
author, that he has the convenience of having his arable land in fewer
pieces; but if he has his 18 acres all in one piece instead of in 20,
he cannot plough them with fewer than the three horses he previously
ploughed with. Then he has no enclosure to put his horses in; he no
longer has the common to turn them on. His right on the down would
entitle him to an allotment of sheepdown of about 20 acres, perhaps
two miles from home. This is too small for him to be able to take it
up, so he accepts instead an increase of arable land. But now he has
no down on which to feed his sheep, no common shepherd to take charge
of his sheep, which are too few to enable him individually to employ a
shepherd. He, therefore, must part with his flock and then has no sheep
to manure his land; further, having no cow-common, and very little
pasture land, he cannot keep cows to make dung with his straw. Lastly,
the arable land being in general entirely unsuited to turn to grass,
he is prevented from enclosing his allotment, and laying it down in
pasture.[59] Obviously in such circumstances the small farmer, after
for a few years raising diminishing crops from his impoverished arable
land, must succumb, and in some cases help as a labourer to till his
fields for another man, in other cases drift to the towns or enlist.
[59] _Ibid._, p. 80.
The contemporaneous decay of rural manufacturing industry,[60] of
course, greatly aggravated the depopulating effects of enclosure. It
may even have precipitated enclosure by weakening the position of the
small farmer during the period of the French wars: during a time,
that is, in which a combination of causes, apart from enclosure,
was favouring the extension of large farms at the expense of small
farms.[61]
[60] “The villages down this Valley of Avon, and indeed, it was
the same in almost every part of this county, and in the North and
West of Hampshire also, used to have great employment for the women
and children in the carding and spinning of wool for the making of
broadcloth. This was a very general employment for the women and
girls, but it is now wholly gone.” (Cobbett, “Rural Rides,” p. 385,
1830 edition, written August, 1826.)
[61] These causes were (_a_) the great fluctuations in prices of
agricultural produce; (_b_) the custom of using poor relief as a
supplement to agricultural wages. The way in which these operated is
ably dealt with by Dr. Cunningham.
In the south-east of Wiltshire, then, enclosure was followed by no
increase of pasture farming, but it was followed by local depopulation.
Whether the depopulation was merely local, or national as well, would
depend upon whether, after enclosure, the total production of food of
the parish were increased or diminished. Thomas Davis tells us that in
many cases it was diminished, the reason, no doubt, being that there
was a lack of farmers with sufficient enterprise and control of capital
to absorb the small farms, as their occupiers began to drift towards
bankruptcy. That such a result as this was felt to be an impending
danger is shown by his statement:--“In some late inclosures allotments
of arable land to small farmers have been set out adjoining to each
other, directing the same to remain in an uninclosed state with a
common right of sheep-feed over the whole, and a common allotment of
down land and another of water-meadows, and some inclosed pasture to
each if necessary.”
In this district, consisting of open downs, stretching for miles
along the summits and higher slopes of the chalk hills; intersected
by winding rivers bordered by flat alluvial land of naturally rich
pasture, but converted by irrigation into the famous Wiltshire water
meadows, the long lower slopes of the hills, as it were, decreed by
nature to be noble corn fields, cultivation had to be on a large scale;
the unit of cultivation had to be a piece of land of reasonable width,
stretching from the river to the summit of the downs. Hence small farms
could not exist without some degree of organised mutual help. When that
organisation, which in this district was furnished by the common field
system, was terminated by Enclosure Acts, consolidation of farms became
necessary.
Nowhere else are these conditions present in quite so fully developed
a degree as in Wiltshire, which contains the central hub from which
radiate the three great belts of chalk down, the South Downs, the North
Downs, and the range containing the Chilterns, the chalk hills of
Hertfordshire, the Gog-Magogs of Cambridgeshire, and their continuation
into Norfolk. But the most essential feature of Wiltshire agriculture,
viz., the combination of sheep down and arable field, may be said to
be characteristic of all this country. This is the country from which
in the sixteenth century came the great indignant outcry against
enclosure, which in More’s “Utopia” enters into the classic literature
of our country. When it is remembered that the economic motive of
enclosure then was the high price of wool, that private individuals
are stated to have owned flocks of ten thousand, twenty thousand, and
even of twenty-four thousand sheep[62], it is easy to conceive of whole
parishes being converted into great sheep runs.
[62] Preamble to 25 Henry VIII. c. 13.