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Agricultural labourers

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  • Agricultural labourers

    Not really a research question....just curious if anyone has any comments. One of my ancestors, who was an agricultural labourer, doesn't seem to have stayed in one place for any length of time....he seems to have been continually criss crossing the East Midlands. I realise they would have had to move from farm to farm to get work (I've got an ag lab in another family who seems to have divided his time between 2 villages), but this does seem a bit extreme. Wondering if it's an indication that a farmer wasn't keen to take him on again or was this fairly frequent ?

  • #2
    Hi Greyingrey

    I can't say I'm an expert but I was under the impression that an ag lab would be taken on for a year at the local hiring fair.

    I know some of mine seemed to move a long way, but once I realised that the nearest fair may be a days walk away, you can soon get some big distances between last year's farm and next year's farm if you see what I mean.
    Barbara

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    • #3
      I think also some of the ag labs didn't particually want to settle down either and were happy moving from place to place especially if they were unmarried.
      Lin

      Searching Lowe, Everitt, Hurt and Dunns in Nottingham

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      • #4
        Originally posted by greyingrey View Post
        Not really a research question....just curious if anyone has any comments. One of my ancestors, who was an agricultural labourer, doesn't seem to have stayed in one place for any length of time....he seems to have been continually criss crossing the East Midlands. I realise they would have had to move from farm to farm to get work (I've got an ag lab in another family who seems to have divided his time between 2 villages), but this does seem a bit extreme. Wondering if it's an indication that a farmer wasn't keen to take him on again or was this fairly frequent ?
        Ditto Barbara's comments

        My tree is full of ag labs on many lines, LOL.
        Taking just census returns, none of them were with the same farmer for two consecutive records.
        Ag labs weren't always keen to stay with the same farmer - many of them were notoriously "mean/pennypinching." If you were single and living in, some times a farm was reported to be a "bad meathouse" (i.e the rations were very poor) so you looked for another place.
        You have to take into account marital status - may have been harder to find a place with a tied cottage, meaning you had to move further away.
        You also have to bear in mind changes in farming, both economic return and the employment of new practices. Both had an impact on how many workers a farmer needed or could afford.

        Jay
        Janet in Yorkshire



        Genealogists never die - they just swap places in the family tree

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        • #5
          Have a read of this grey

          Edna


          Ag Labs. Salt of the Earth! How about this? Found in Liverpool Family Historian June 02

          Food For Thought- He must have been an Ag Lab

          "Ask yourselves whether you know the gestation period for a sheep or a cow, and you can't read or write to make a note of it. The ag lab knew when the animal would calve by observing the position of the stars and work it out from that, or from the particular religious festivals being celebrated in church at the appropriate times. Reading and writing is one thing, but it wasn't necessary, numeracy however or a limited knowledge of it was essential so as to count his or his masters livestock and his own money and to tell the time. It was no good thinking that 7 o'clock came immediately after three bells had just struck on the church clock!

          There was no electricity, the lanes were bad and there was no health service. The Ag lab knew how to make his own rush lights to light his home, the shortest and driest route between 2 places and which herbs to pick as remedies for his families ailments. He knew his neighbours far better than we know ours. We isolate ourselves in our cars and in front of our television sets. He relied on neighbours with different skills from his, to help him out when the need arose. He was thrifty where we borrow on bits of plastic he and his family had to make ends meet regardless or with great shame go on the parish.

          Yes he could even forecast his local weather watching the reactions of wildlife and plants to changing conditions. He was far better at it than any of us from our centrally heated homes and offices. He knew how to thatch and how to get straight straw for thatching whereas we send for experts to fix a cracked slate.

          He was tough. He could walk for days behind a plough, pulled by a team of horses, and still walk miles to church each Sunday. A 20 mile walk laden with produce or purchases to and from market each week was also the norm for some. No fancily equipped gymnasium for him, yet he was fitter than today's health freaks who maybe should take a lesson or two from his ancestors.

          Can you use a sickle or scythe from dawn to dusk, in all weathers? Can you snare a rabbit for dinner or cut beanpoles from a hedge in a manner that will promote further growth? Can you mix your own whitewash, or train a dog to hunt or round up sheep for you? Come to that can you milk a cow or slaughter and butcher a sheep or pig?

          So called ag labs were no fools. they survived and very few of us would be here to read this if they hadn't!

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          • #6
            One of mine was missing from home on one census, he popped in a market town as a lodger and it turned out there was a regular corn market on that day annually, so likely to have been on farm business.

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            • #7
              You might find this article from our magazine interesting:

              The Agricultural Labourer ( the 'Ag Lab' )
              Caroline
              Caroline's Family History Pages
              Meddle not in the affairs of Dragons, for you are crunchy and good with ketchup.

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              • #8
                Another aspect to this is that they did'nt have much in the way of material possesions so it was easy for them to move about, also there would be some farmers growing different crops at different times of year

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