“I find, July 29th, that ‘in the parish of Madeley, Salop, there are 924 families; and since the use of Tea is becoming so prevalent, on a moderate calculation each family consumes three and a half pounds of flour each week more than formerly, by instituting a fourth meal each day. In days of yore, Breakfast, Dinner and Supper were esteemed sufficient, but now it must be Breakfast, Dinner, Tea and Supper, which wastes both Meal and Time, and makes a difference each week in the parish of Madeley of 3234 lbs. of flour.’”
In that same year, on the ninth of July, a meeting of numerous gentlemen, farmers, millers, and tradesmen was held at the Tontine, on “the alarming occasion of the scarcity of corn and dearness of all kinds of other provisions,” and a committee was appointed for the immediate collection of contributions and the purchase of such grain as could be procured, to be distributed to the necessitous at a reduction of one fourth, or nine shillings for twelve. The wants of the poor were described as being beyond what they had at any former time experienced, and according to the best accounts that could be collected the quantity of grain of all sorts in the country was very far short of the consumption before harvest. Many families in Madeley were short of bread, and the colliers were only prevented rising by assurances that gentlemen of property were disposed to contribute liberally to their relief as well as to adopt measures for obtaining from distant parts, such aid as could be procured. The committee directed 2,000 bushels of Indian corn to be sent for from Liverpool, to meet immediate requirements, but such were the murmurs of the poor according to a letter from Richard Reynolds to Mr. Smitheman, that it was impossible to say what would be the consequences, and the writer adds:—
“I should not be surprised if they applied in a body at those houses where they expected to find provisions, or from which they thought they ought to be relieved. They already begin to make distinctions between those whom they consider as their benefactors, and those whom (as George Forester expresses it in the annexed letter) are at war with their landlords; and I fear those whom they consider as deserting them in their distress, would not only incur their disapprobation, but might be the next to suffer from their resentment. I therefore the more readily attempt to fulfil my appointment by recommending thee in the most earnest manner to send by the return of the post to Richard Dearman at this place, who is appointed treasurer on the present occasion, a bill for such a sum as thou shalt think proper to contribute, and at the same time to write to thy servant at the West Coppice to give notice to thy tenants, (as G. Forester has to his) and especially to William Parton of Little Wenlock, that it is thy desire that he and they should conform to the general practice and deliver immediately all his wheat to the committee, at twelve shillings per bushel, for the use of the poor. And if there is any wheat, barley, beans, or peas, at the West Coppice, or elsewhere in thy possession or power, I recommend thee to order it to be sent without delay to the Committee; and then if the colliers, &c., should go in a body, or send, as I think more likely a deputation to thy house, thy having so done, and thy servant shewing them thy order for so doing, as well as thy contributing liberally as above proposed, will be the most likely means to prevent the commencement of mischief, the end of which, if once began, it is impossible to ascertain.”
The letter goes on to state that the following sums had been subscribed: George Forester, £105. Cecil Forester, £105. J. H. Browne, £105. the Coalbrookdale Company, £105. and John Wilkinson, £50. In addition to this the writer, Richard Reynolds, and J. H. Browne had consented to advance £700. each to be repaid out of the corn sold at the reduced price.
Mr. Reynolds concludes by saying, “such is the urgency of the temper of the people, that there is not a day to lose if we are desirous to preserve the poor from outrage, and most likely the country from plunder, if not from blood.”
Periods of distress and panic arising from scarcity were not unfrequent when wages were stationary, or comparatively so. Great changes had taken place during the periods previously described. First, during feudal times, here and elsewhere the great body of peasantry was composed of persons who rented small farms, seldom exceeding twenty or thirty acres, and who paid their rent either in kind or in agricultural labour and services performed on the demesne of the landlord: secondly, of cottagers, each of whom had a small croft or parcel of land attached to his dwelling, and the privilege of turning out a cow, or pigs, or a few sheep, into the woods, commons, and wastes of the manor. During this period, the population derived its subsistence immediately from the land;—the landowner from the produce of his demesne, cultivated partly by his domestic slaves, but principally by the labour of the tenants and cottiers attached to the manor; the tenants from the produce of their little farms; and the cottiers from that of their cows and crofts, except while working upon the demesne, when they were generally fed by the landlord. The mechanics of the village, not having time to cultivate a sufficient quantity of land, received a fixed allowance of agricultural produce from each tenant.
Under the above system, not only the little farmer, but also the humblest cottager, drew a very considerable portion of his subsistence directly from the land. His cow furnished him with what is invaluable to a labourer,—a store of milk in the summer months; his pig, fattened upon the common and with the refuse vegetables of his garden, supplied him with bacon for his winter consumption—and there were poultry besides.
Gradually the labourer and small cultivator lost the use they had made of the road-side and other waste which were assigned under inclosure acts, not to the occupier, but the owner of the cottage; few cottages were in the occupation of their owners; they generally, indeed we may say universally, belonged to the proprietors of the neighbouring farms, and the allotments granted in lieu of the extinguished common rights were generally added to the large farms, and seldom attached to the cottages. The cottages which were occupied by their owners had of course allotments attached to them; but these by degrees passed by sale into the hands of some large proprietor in the neighbourhood, De facto, in ninety-nine cases out of the hundred, the allotment has been detached from the cottage, and thrown into the occupation of some adjoining farmer.
That such a charge should have been attended with important consequences, can excite no surprise, a complete severance was effected between the peasantry and the soil; the little farmers and cottiers were converted into day-labourers, depending entirely upon daily earnings which may, and frequently did, in point of fact, fail them. They had no land upon the produce of which to fall as a reserve when the demand for labour happened to be slack. This revolution became unquestionably the cause of the heavy and increasing burdens upon parishes in the form of poor-rates, and jail rates.
It has been well said that from the moment when any man begins to think that