DOI article:
Perkins, John A.: Harvest technology and labour supply in Lincolnshire and the East Riding of Yorkshire 1750-1850, 2
DOI Page / Citation link:https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.49000#0133
HARVEST TECHNOLOGY - LABOUR SUPPLY
127
ing facilitated the raking of the stubbles and,
especially in contrast to shearing, sheaves fall-
ing off the waggons when the harvest was
“carried home” were not lost to the gleaners.
In nineteenth-century Lincolnshire: ‘Fields
shorn by the sickle ... were always preferred
by the gleaners, because the fields could not be
raked properly, and moreover, any sheaves
falling off the waggon were lost in the long
stubble’ (Waller 13).
Another source of grain-saving arising from
the adoption of mowing in place of reaping
was occasioned by the reduction of shedding,
or the shaking of grain from the ears by the
action of cutting. This was especially import-
ant in the upland districts where white varie-
ties of wheat such as Hunter’s White and its
derivative Hopetoun, which were prone to
shed, both thrived and enjoyed a premium in
markets over the red varieties of the tradi-
tional lowland corn-growing districts that
were ‘less liable to be shaken than white’. At
the same time, this tendency of white wheats
was one factor that stimulated the adoption of
early in place of late cutting of cereals, or
when the crops were not fully ripe. In part,
the spread of this practice was also dependent
upon the adoption of the threshing-machine
in place of the hand-flail, because the thresh-
ing of grain not fully ripe by hand was a source
of ‘additional expense’ and ‘constant com-
plaints of the threshers’. But by cutting the
straw before it became dry and brittle, in addi-
tion to a better sample and larger quantity of
grain and more edible straw being produced
over an extended harvest period, the process
of mowing was made considerably easier
(Stephens 329; Dalrymple 65).
The influence of grain-saving upon farmers
as a stimulus to the adoption of the scythe,
which became important during the war
period when grain prices reached near-famine
levels, was likely to have varied inversely with
the strength of tradition amongst the farming
community and to relate positively to the av-
erage size of farms. It was in the traditional
corn-growing districts of the lowlands that:
‘The ears of wheat which have been scattered
unavoidably, in reaping the crop, have been
considered, time immemorially, as the per-
quisite of the poor’ (Marshall 102). And
amongst the predominantly small farmers of
the lowlands the power of custom may have
been reinforced by the existence of close ties
of blood and status with “the poor”. On the
uplands, on the other hand, the cultivation of
cereals on an extensive scale was an innovation
of the later eighteenth century, and the power
of tradition in respect of gleaning, as in other
aspects of arable farming, was very weak. In-
stead, the large farmers of the uplands were
perhaps more influenced by the objections to
gleaning that were raised by contemporary
agricultural writers, than were their often il-
literate lowland counterparts.
Many agricultural writers viewed gleaning
as acting to reduce the potential supply of
harvest labour, and especially of ancillary
workers required where the technique of
mowing was adopted; to compromise the
rights and the ‘privacy’ of property; and to
represent an aberration from the ‘proper’
employee-employer relationships of capitalist
agriculture. To most upland farmers the fact
that the substitution of the scythe for the
sickle resulted in a ‘loss of gleaning to the
poor’ was therefore ‘no valid objection’ to the
changeover (Marshall; LRSM 5 Sept, 1828; 28
Oct. 1842; Roberts 77). And they were par-
ticularly moved in that direction by the en-
hanced visibility of the grain-saving arising on
large in comparison to small farms from the
adoption of the scythe.
The large farmers of the uplands were more
motivated to adopt the scythe in place of the
sickle than the small farmers of the lowlands,
by the greater absolute saving of labour
realised on a large acreage of cereals. In other
127
ing facilitated the raking of the stubbles and,
especially in contrast to shearing, sheaves fall-
ing off the waggons when the harvest was
“carried home” were not lost to the gleaners.
In nineteenth-century Lincolnshire: ‘Fields
shorn by the sickle ... were always preferred
by the gleaners, because the fields could not be
raked properly, and moreover, any sheaves
falling off the waggon were lost in the long
stubble’ (Waller 13).
Another source of grain-saving arising from
the adoption of mowing in place of reaping
was occasioned by the reduction of shedding,
or the shaking of grain from the ears by the
action of cutting. This was especially import-
ant in the upland districts where white varie-
ties of wheat such as Hunter’s White and its
derivative Hopetoun, which were prone to
shed, both thrived and enjoyed a premium in
markets over the red varieties of the tradi-
tional lowland corn-growing districts that
were ‘less liable to be shaken than white’. At
the same time, this tendency of white wheats
was one factor that stimulated the adoption of
early in place of late cutting of cereals, or
when the crops were not fully ripe. In part,
the spread of this practice was also dependent
upon the adoption of the threshing-machine
in place of the hand-flail, because the thresh-
ing of grain not fully ripe by hand was a source
of ‘additional expense’ and ‘constant com-
plaints of the threshers’. But by cutting the
straw before it became dry and brittle, in addi-
tion to a better sample and larger quantity of
grain and more edible straw being produced
over an extended harvest period, the process
of mowing was made considerably easier
(Stephens 329; Dalrymple 65).
The influence of grain-saving upon farmers
as a stimulus to the adoption of the scythe,
which became important during the war
period when grain prices reached near-famine
levels, was likely to have varied inversely with
the strength of tradition amongst the farming
community and to relate positively to the av-
erage size of farms. It was in the traditional
corn-growing districts of the lowlands that:
‘The ears of wheat which have been scattered
unavoidably, in reaping the crop, have been
considered, time immemorially, as the per-
quisite of the poor’ (Marshall 102). And
amongst the predominantly small farmers of
the lowlands the power of custom may have
been reinforced by the existence of close ties
of blood and status with “the poor”. On the
uplands, on the other hand, the cultivation of
cereals on an extensive scale was an innovation
of the later eighteenth century, and the power
of tradition in respect of gleaning, as in other
aspects of arable farming, was very weak. In-
stead, the large farmers of the uplands were
perhaps more influenced by the objections to
gleaning that were raised by contemporary
agricultural writers, than were their often il-
literate lowland counterparts.
Many agricultural writers viewed gleaning
as acting to reduce the potential supply of
harvest labour, and especially of ancillary
workers required where the technique of
mowing was adopted; to compromise the
rights and the ‘privacy’ of property; and to
represent an aberration from the ‘proper’
employee-employer relationships of capitalist
agriculture. To most upland farmers the fact
that the substitution of the scythe for the
sickle resulted in a ‘loss of gleaning to the
poor’ was therefore ‘no valid objection’ to the
changeover (Marshall; LRSM 5 Sept, 1828; 28
Oct. 1842; Roberts 77). And they were par-
ticularly moved in that direction by the en-
hanced visibility of the grain-saving arising on
large in comparison to small farms from the
adoption of the scythe.
The large farmers of the uplands were more
motivated to adopt the scythe in place of the
sickle than the small farmers of the lowlands,
by the greater absolute saving of labour
realised on a large acreage of cereals. In other