Week 46: My ancestor was an agricultural labourer

[Jill on the A272]

Week 46: Agricultural labourer



Did someone in your family tree work on the land? This is an opportunity to showcase an agricultural labourer from your family tree, you might want to offer a short biography and speak about their work eg
Name
Birth location/date
Family background
Where you've found them on the census
Their workplace/employer
Any tips on researching this occupation?

[NB shepherds, farmers, carters and bailiffs have their own entries]

Trades and Occupations - Family Tree Forum

Next week: Customs Officer

[Lin Fisher]

Got a few of these.

George Hurt, my 3 x G Grandfather, was born in Aug 1796 in Barton in Fabis Nottinghamshire. On all census he was an Ag Lab. He married Sarah Saunders on 31 May 1819 in Ruddington Notts. I have a copy of the Barton Moors account where he was paid for work done in the village by the owner of the Hall. Probably clearing the common and hedge cutting. There were a list of people for each year.

He was accidently killed as per inquest dated 12 Apr 1871. Newspaper articles say he was on a horse and cart and came to the level crossing at Attenborough and the gates were shut. He decided to open them and pass through. The crossing man dashed out to stop him but George didn't hear as he was partially dear and blind. Very sad.

I go through the crossing everytime I go to Attenborough nature reserve and think of both him and the train driver, also the crossing man. Must have been horrendous.

[Lin Fisher]

Samuel Hurt was Georges Brother born Oct 1789 also in Barton. He was an Ag Lab on every census. He married Sara Tuckwood on 12 Apr 1819 in Old Dolby Leicestershire, just over the borader.

He settled in Gotham Notts and had 5 children but got a Removal Order to move to Farnsfield where apparently he was working before. Think he was claiming parish relief.

He settled there and that is where he died in 1875.

His son Isaac was an ag lab on 1841 census but Married in 1856 and moved to Hertfordshire and became a farmer of between 40 or 50 acres depending on what census you look at.

[Jill on the A272]

Lin Fisher what a tragic fate for poor George, it's a pity people had to work on well into old age back then.

[Jill on the A272]

My 4x great grandfather William Neal (1771-1853) appears on the 1841 and 1851 census at Sutton, Sussex as an Ag Lab and living next door to the White Horse pub (which is still there) though I don't know which direction the census taker walked.

William's father John had been a farmer in the next village of Bignor but had died young when his three sons were 5 and under. William's mother Sarah had inherited some copyhold land from her father, so it may have been this land that William Neal farmed, this land was assessed at £1 11s for land tax in 1798. William had married Abigail Leggatt in 1795 at Bignor and at the baptism of his last child Emma in 1816 he was described as a farmer.

In 1825 he qualified for Lord Egremont's Bounty of Clothes as he had two children under 14 at home. Two of his sons remained unmarried and worked as Ag Labs and were living with their parents in 1851. William died aged 82 in 1853.

[Janet in Yorkshire]

Don't know where to begin as 75% of my extended families were ag labs in both Yorkshire and Norfolk.
However, I have found differences in practice between the two areas. In Norfolk most of the single young men remained in the parental home until they married and set up their own homes. In my part of Yorkshire they went into farm service and lived in at the farm where they worked. At the yearly hirings they accepted the annual pay and conditions and were paid a "fest" to settle the deal - after that they they got no pay until year end and if they fell out with the employer and left, they forfeited the rest of the yearly pay.

My friend's grandfather was the village tailor and at the year end (October) his Mum used to go and help grandfather do his accounts as the farm lads got paid and went to the tailor shop to settle up for any work or Sunday clothes they'd had made during the year.

The "living in" was still going strong until the 1960's. In my time the men were boarded in the hind house and slept in a communal dormitory, the hind's wife provided breakfast, dinner and high tea, and was paid a fixed rate, deducted from the fortnightly wage. Each man had his own wooden box in which to keep his belongings and this stayed at the foot of his bed; he took it with him when he moved posts. On Saturdays the men took their dirty clothes home to mother / relative / or someone else willing to do the laundry for pay/ and the clean washing was picked up the next week when the dirty clothes were dropped off. The dirty/clean laundry was conveyed on foot or by bicycle.

The farm lads did not have the run of the hind house - they slept in the "men's bedroom" and ate in the "men's kitchen." One of the farms in my village had "the slum" in the farmyard; a room in one of the farmyard buildings with an old sofa and table, which the men used as a sitting room if they wished; next to it was a washroom with a toilet and hand basin. The bedroom facilities were appalling - one long room (an attic or room over a barn with separate access) bare floorboards, no curtains, metal bedframes, one central ceiling light and the individual boxes for clothes and possessions. No heating or "extra" blankets in winter.

The farms were rated by the lads as to being a "good meat spot" or a "poor meat spot" depending on the quality, quantity and variety of food on offer.

Looking back now, it's quite shocking that this was the only life that some of the older men in the village had ever experienced. I knew two old boys who had been married but the relationships had broken down, so the wife lived in the family home and the husband lived in at the farm. They cycled "home" on Saturdays with a bag of dirty washing and handed over maintenance money ,never crossed the threshold and rode off again with their clean clothes which had been washed during the week. Once they got to be retirement age they had to leave thefarm and were reliant on some relative taking them in.

[Jill on the A272]

Janet in Yorkshire thank you Janet, that's a fascinating insight into the practicalities of an ag lab's life.

Bringing the accommodation issue up to modern times - my son currently lives in what was built as an ag lab's cottage. The main (ancient) farmhouse across the road and was sold as a rich man's residence in the 1950s. The pair of farm cottages was built in the 1880s and I have found adverts in the local paper advertising for a stockman or a cowman but they specify a family man. My son rents one from his friend the farmer while the farmer lives in the other. There is an ag lab who lives in a static mobile home on site, the farmer recently bought a modern one for him as the existing one from when he bought the farm was getting old, he had to apply for a road closure to get it to the site as their lane is very narrow.