History

mow a meadow at Ralph Downs Farm

of elm trees from Road Lane Farm to Puxey Lane. Sadly, these magnificent elms were classified as unsafe in 1940 and were subsequently felled. Following the death of the other joint tenant, the tenancy for this part of the farmhouse, together with the adjoining land, was also transferred to my father. The land included a small orchard of apple and plum trees. A pathway through this orchard led to the river Divilish. The River Divilish was our only source of domestic drinking water. This meant the water was carried by the bucketful, from the river to our washhouse, where a large churn was used as a storage container. My mother must have carried the thousands of gallons of water over the years using yokes, which hung from her shoulders, with a bucket on either side. My father built pigsties and poultry houses on his land and later, builder Wilf Cluett, the landlord at The Three Roars Heads at Lydlinch, constructed a stable block. Each spring my father would hatch around two hundred chickens. He had rows of orange boxes lined with straw, with a sitting of fifteen eggs to each broody hen. After 21 days, the chicks would hatch and the hens would be given 10 minutes to exercise and allow them time to eat and drink. Following hatching the hens and their broods were given a coop of their own, made from tea chests. The paddock around our house contained chickens of all sizes. When old enough the hens were separated from the cocks and when the hens reached the point of lay they joined the laying flock, allowing them to roam free range. The cocks would then be sold, except for a small number, which were fattened for the Christmas market. One year we had two geese, which my father had reared for Christmas Day, one for the family and one to sell. Unfortunately a fox came in broad daylight and killed both of them. As a result rabbit was on the menu for Christmas Day that year. To augment his income in these early years, my father mowed during the haymaking season. He bought a second horse, who also cut, turned and hauled his own hay. My mother also put in many laborious hours in the hay field and would take me in the pram to rake the fields. Eventually, she took all four children into the fields, where we would eat a sandwich lunch, or bread, butter and a huge piece of cheese to share. We would drink cocoa, tea, or lemonade made from Eiffel Tower crystals. The horses were tied up under a shady tree to have a feed and drink, while father joined us for our lunch. The afternoon session lasted until milking time and the evening session took us up to around 10pm.

ONE MAN: Mowing a meadow

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By Miranda Robertson

newsdesk@blackmorevale.net A former Methodist chapel of international importance is to finally be restored after a six-year campaign raising more than £650,000. The crumbling Grade II* listed building in Tolpuddle – a rare surviving example of a 19th century vernacular non-conformist chapel built by the Tolpuddle Martyrs –is on the Historic England’s At Risk list. The chapel was built in 1818 by the Dorsetshire Labourers who in 1838 became known as Tolpuddle Martyrs, after they established a trade union and were transported to Australia after a trial for swearing secret oaths. The little chapel, which was recently covered in ivy and was in a very poor state before being patched up as a temporary measure in 2015, was one of the places where the six discussed ideas to challenge their employers over their poor pay and conditions. Initially, the chapel was used simply for nonconformist worship, led by lay preacher and eventual Martyr George Loveless. But as they were building it, conditions for agricultural workers – and indeed, many other professions in Dorset – were deteriorating. Poor pay led to more than ten per cent of the county being given poor relief. A recession in agriculture exacerbated this situation and in 1830 riots broke out in southern England. While some landowners were persuaded to raise wages, a series of arrests of rioting labourers gave them the confidence to bring them down again. Enough was enough. The six men from Tolpuddle founded the Friendly Society of Agricultural Labourers as a friendly society formed to protest about their poor pay. Wages were about to hit six shillings a week – they refused to work for less than ten. But this infuriated magistrate and landowner James Frampton – he wrote to the Home Secretary to complain and the six found themselves in court. They were tried in the Shire Hall Courthouse in Dorchester, transported to Australia and Tasmania, pardoned and eventually five of the six moved to London Ontario in Canada to start a new life. These events played a huge role in the subsequent evolution of the Trade Union movement which is still celebrated today by the annual Tolpuddle Martyrs’ Festival. Unions owe such a debt of gratitude to the Martyrs –the Union of Shop, Distributive and Allied Workers has donated nearly £4,000 for the chapel’s new front door. The Martyrs’ Museum stands as a well-tended testament to the courage of six labourers from the small village in Dorset. But the little chapel they

GOING TO THE CHAPEL: The Tolpuddle Methodist Chapel before being patched up

MAKING PLANS: An impression of the completed chapel by Architecton and, below, TOCT volunteer Ian Cray’s image of how Tolpuddle Old Chapel may have looked back in 1818, when the building had a thatched half-hip roof and, right, before and after emergency repairs in 2015