Botanical walks, can Linnaeus help trace ones ancestors?

Cardamine amara  (left hand plant) collected in June 1838 and Mildenhall now in Birmingham University Botanical Collection

A few years ago, I was the recipient of a totally unexpected email from Gigi Crompton [1] a researcher at the Cambridge Botanical Garden who had read an article that I had posted onto the internet about my great great grandfather, the Revd. Harry Baber. 

Did I know that he had been involved in botanical trips while at Cambridge University?

Harry Baber (1817-1892) in 1840.

The Botanical Garden has been engaged in a project for many years that is trying to measure the changes brought about to the flora of Cambridgeshire due to climate change, and mans modifications to the landscapes. They have been going back through the botanical collections and records held since the 1530's in order to try to determine how many plants had been lost, by comparing the lists with current survey details.

Harry Baber was recorded by Charles Cardale Babington (1808 – 1895), the author of "Flora of Cambridgeshire" (1860)making many trips together out into the Cambridgeshire countryside botanising.

Charles Cardale Babington (1808-1895)

Babington was nine years older than Harry Baber, and had been studying botany under Professor John Stevens Henslow (1796-1861), who was professor of Botany at Cambridge. Henslow had also mentored Charles Darwin, and it is this work that he is best remembered for these days.

It had been Henslow who had put forward Darwin's name as being a suitable companion and botanist for Captain Fitzroy who was about to depart on HMS Beagle.[2]

Records exist both on the notes written on the back of the pressed plant specimens preserved in the Cambridge Botanical Garden and also in sources like the diaries of Charles Babington and notes made by Professor Henslow, which record that Harry Baber had been on some of the trips that Henslow and Babington had made, and these describe the locations and the finds they had made.

The Flora survey listed University Database included details of the following excursions.

Chenopodium rubrum Stretham, H. Baber (Hb CC Babington), Oct.1838, CGE.

Lamium purpureum  Grantchester, H Baber, 6.1837, CGE.

Lythrum hyssopifolia L. Stretham, H Baber, 9.1837, E.

Myosotis ramosissima Pit beyond Observatory, as M.collina flore albo., [var mittenii Baber added in pencil], H Baber, 6.1837, CGE.

Mentha x gentilis var cardiaca (Baber), Marshy field by Finch¹s Walk, Cambridge,.

Rorippa amph. Stretham, H Baber, 7.1838, CGE; near Ely, H Baber, n.d. (but Babington label), CGE;

Trifolium subterraneum Gamlingay, Prof Henslow, H Baber (in pencil), HB Churchill Babington, 1836, CGE.

Sparganium emersum Stretham-fen, as S.simplex, H Baber, 8.1837, CGE.

Veronica agrestis Stretham, H Baber, 30.9.1837, CGE.

Veronica polita Stretham, H Baber, 30.1837, CGE.

Lycopodium clavatum Stretham, H Baber, 9.1837, E.

Minuartia Went with Baber to Madingley...We noticed...Arenaria tenuifolia just come up, in the gravel pit near to the Observatory. 29.5.1837 Bab.Mem.62.

Muscari neglectum Hinton, H Baber, 5,1859, BM.

Oenanthe

Oenan pimpinelloides Wilburton, H Baber, Hb JA Power, 7.1838, 'I call this pseudanifolia, Poll. CE Salmon', & pimpinelloides crossed out. RTE.

Potamogeton compressus Stretham fen, H Baber, 6.1839, det. Dandy & Taylor, UCNW.

Potamogeton gramineus Stretham, H Baber, 1837, det. Dandy & Taylor, CLE.

Pulsatilla vulgaris Gogmagog Hills, H. Baber, May 1837, BM. Cambridgeshire, H Baber, Hb JA Power, 5.1838, RTE.

Gogmagog Hills, H Baber, 1839. ex Hb. F Tansom [?spelling.], YRK:6.

Gogmagog Hills, H Baber, Hb JA Power, 1839, RTE.

Gogmagog Hills, Mr H. Baber in Hb Mrs Atkins, 1839, BM.

Taraxacum palustre Ely, H. Baber, 1839, BM.

For a long time I have been waiting for an opportunity to see if I could repeat some of these trips. It would be important to choose the same time of year as the earlier trips otherwise many of the plants would be dormant and invisible.
Harry Baber had been educated at Westminster School, and matriculated at Michaelmas 1834. He was admitted to Trinity College Cambridge on the 13th of June 1834. He became a Scholar in 1835, and a Bachelor of Arts in 1839 and an MA in 1842.

Although he had gone to Cambridge University in order to take his degree so that he would be able to qualify to go on to take Holy Orders, he does not appear to initially have been intending to study botany. In this he was not alone as Charles Darwin, when he had gone up to Cambridge in 1828, it was only in his second year that he began to attend Professor Henslow's lectures.

These lectures did not form part of the curriculum for either student's degrees, and would have to be paid for separately. The core of the degree course in those days mainly revolved around mathematics largely based on Newton's Principia, or Newtonian Physics and moral philosophy.

Henslow's lectures soon became very successful drawing 60 to 70 people to each event. The attendees included not just students but many senior members of the university, including Adam Sedgwick, and William Whewell. [3]

Babington had attended the lectures for three years, paying for each year, but when he reappeared for the fourth year, Henslow relented and he was awarded a free course.

Carex obrubae, or False Fox-sedge collected at Stretham in June 1838

Professor Henslow was in the habit of holding an annual excursion for the students and other members of the audiences of his lectures which would go to Gamlingay Heath which is located about twenty miles west of Cambridge. Carriages were hired to transport the members of the botany club out to Gamlingay, for those members of the party who did not themselves ride. Wives and sisters of the members were also able to join the excursions, that had a strong social aspect to them.

They became a social highlight of the early summer when the lectures and exams were coming to an end.

Gamlingay Heath from the 1900 Ordnance Survey Map. In the 1830's the heath was more open, with few of the hedges shown, or indeed the brick works.

As the day drew to a close a meal was laid on in a nearby inn, and a band was hired to help the evening festivities along. Between sixteen and twenty people generally attended, at a cost of 12 shillings each. These trips which started in 1827 were so popular that they continued every year until 1852. Other trips were made taking advantage of the River Cam down towards Ely, which would have passed Little Thetford and Stretham, which was Harry Baber's family home.

John Stevens Henslow, (1796-1861)

From 1828 until 1837, Professor Henslow held "Friday Evenings" at his home in Cambridge at which many of the most highly regarded scientists of their day were frequently in attendance as well as his students.

The Modern track onto Gamlingay Heath. In the 1830's the Heath would have been much more open, and was probably given over to common grazing.

Trifolium subterraneum

As Gamlingay is only about 14 miles away from my home and with restrictions on travel slowly starting to lift, I decided to make the journey on Monday 25th May 2020.

I was in search of..

"Trifolium subterraneum Gamlingay, Prof Henslow, H Baber (in pencil), HB Churchill Babington, 1836, CGE"

This is where my difficulties began, because clover in its many forms is very common in England, but this one is different from all of the others in only one key respect only. According to Wikipedia, it is alone amongst all the other clovers in that it seeds under ground.

"Trifolium subterraneum", the subterranean clover which, is a species of Clover "native to northwestern Europe, from Ireland east to Belgium". The plant's name comes from its underground seed development geocarpy, a characteristic not possessed by other clovers. It can thrive in poor-quality soil where other clovers cannot survive, and is grown commercially for animal fodder. There are three distinct subspecies used in agriculture, each with its own ideal climate and soil type, allowing for wide distribution of the plant over varied environments.
 
Subterraneum is the generalist subspecies, and it can be grown in the widest range of environments,is grown in moist areas that are prone to flooding.T. subterraneum brachycalycinum is a more sensitive plant, requiring dry, cracked soil for its germination." 

Plants on Gamlingay Heath in May 2020

While very success as a pleasant walk in a remote part of Cambridgeshire, I am afraid that my skills as a botanist are strictly limited. Lacking the skills of a Babington or a Henslow, I have no idea if the clover I saw was the correct one.

In my defence,  Trifolium subterraneum has become very rare these days.  The reason for these is that wide scale advances in agricultural improvements during the 1840's and into the 20th Century have altered the soil pH. and fertility out of all recognition since 1839. The soil at Gamlingay is very sandy, but it is a cap only a few feet deep over lying clays. This is evidenced by the presence of 19th Century brick pits and the sites of former kilns on three of the four sides of the woods.

Improving farmers during the 18th Century like my four x great grandfather Josiah Rodwell had already worked out that by digging up the underlying clays, and mixing the clays with the sands they would produce a very great improvement to the soils fertility, and this increase in fertility wiped out many of the highly specialised plants that had formerly grown on this heath.

In 1837 Henslow decided to move his permanent place of residence to Hitcham in Suffolk, only travelling back to the University at Cambridge for the Spring Term, when he gave his lectures.

It is not known when Harry Baber first began his interest in botany, however it probably arose from his living in an apartment attached to the British Library where his father the Rev. Henry Hervey Baber was Keeper of the Printed Books at the British Library until 1837.  Harry's father also had responsibility for the natural history collection.

At that time there was no Natural History Museum, and a natural history collection had formed part of the British Museum's collection since 1758 when the Rev. Andrew Planta who had come from Switzerland was appointed Assistant Librarian of Natural History.

Planta's son Joseph, also worked on natural history as an Assistant Librarian in the Department of Printed Books. In 1814 Joseph Planta accompanied Henry Hervey Baber on his trip to Munich where Baber purchased a major botanical collection from Baron Von Moll.

The Apartments in the entrance quadrangle to the British Library where Harry Baber lived with his father.  The museum and library entrance was just off to the right of this picture. 

Both the British Library and the British Museum were located in a single building that stood on the site of the existing British Museum, and Harry who was born in 1817, would have lived with his parents in a flat built in the courtyard to the front of the museum that came with the post of Keeper of the Printed Books.[4]  This would have allowed Harry access to one of the largest collections in Britain at that time.

The earliest collecting expedition in which Harry is known to have taken part in, that we are aware of took place in April 1837, when he found and example of Arabis turrita which is preserved in the Herbarium at the Perth Museum in Scotland.

"The Perth collection also includes an example of Grape-hyacinth Muscari neglectum which is recorded as having been collected in Cherry Hinton, in May 1837.

On "May 29. [1837, Babington] Went with Baber to Madingley.  Lamium Galeobdolon was just come into flower.  We noticed Cerastium arvense in flower, and Arenaria tenufolia just come up, in the gravel pit near to the Observatory.  Leontodon palustre was in flower in Madingley chalk pit."

The gravel pit at Madingley subsequently became abandoned and overgrown. It now forms the eastern most point in the grounds of the American War Cemetery at Madingley.

During June 1838, Harry appears to have been staying in his father's rectory at Stretham near Ely, where he was able to collect an example of Carex obrubae, or False Fox-sedge.  He then pressed the sample to dry it. Harry then arranged for the sample to be sent to his friend at the Royal Botanical Garden at Edinburgh, where it survives to this day. [5]

Stretham is located in the Fens directly to the north of Cambridge, on the main road towards Ely.  During the winter, the village was almost an island, as the surrounding area became flooded by winter runoff from the catchment of the Ouse.  Harry was witnessing one of the last summer's before the installation of a major new steam pumping engine at Stretham would draw down the waters, destroying the wetlands for every, and allowing most of the land to be turned over to arable land.

Cardamine Amara collected by Harry Baber, July 1838, Mildenhall.

Harry Baber's time at Cambridge began a year or more after Charles Darwin left.  It is largely due to modern interest in Charles Darwin that the records that allow me to follow Harry Baber's botanical interests have survived.

It is at this point that from the records of Charles Darwin, that a really intriguing set of connections begin to emerge, and these have deep roots into the Suffolk countryside.

Some of the most interesting records of Darwin's time at Cambridge come from the anecdotes recorded by my great x 4 uncle the Revd. John Medows Rodwell who was a student at Cambridge at the same time as Darwin. I will further explore these connections in a second blog post which hopefully will follow shortly.

After leaving University Harry was Ordained as a Deacon at Norwich Cathedral on the 26^th of July 1840.  On the following day, 27^th July 1840 Harry was appointed curate of Barham in Suffolk.  He had been nominated by the Revd. William Kirby Rector of the adjacent parish of Claydon.

Revd William Kirby by Spence

The selection of the Rev. William Kirby as a suitable mentor for Harry Baber as he took up his new role as Curate is an interesting one.  The Revd William Kirby was a very highly regarded lepidopterist.

Natural History was also a professional interest of Henry Hervey Baber, especially when they were attacking his precious religious texts, his primary interests, as the following letter in John Freeman’s book Life of Rev. William Kirby M.A. Rector of Barham, published in 1852 demonstrates. In this letter dated April 25th 1817, Dr Leach wrote to Rev. Kirby: -

“Mr Baber also Director of the library in the British Museum, sent me another species that had perforated a manuscript from Mount Sinai”

The insect was apparent a Dermestides [6] of a type that was hitherto unknown, and it had shot out of the bindings of an ancient text that had been collected from the famous library at St. Catherine's Monastery at Mount Sinai.

The Dr Leach who wrote the letter was William Elford Leach (1790-1836) Assistant Librarian of Natural History from 1813 to 1822, who worked under Henry Baber at the British Library. [6] 

The recipient William Kirby of the letter was a natural historian of great ability, who was a member of the Royal Society and the Linnaean Society.  From his rectory in Suffolk he corresponded with naturalists in Sweden and South America. It is not clear from the letter how well if at all he knew Henry Baber, but he was later to become closely related to Henry Baber, when Henry’s son Rev. Harry Baber married Sarah Rodwell. Kirby’s second wife was Charlotte Rodwell, Sarah’s aunt.

Henry’s daughter Anne Maria was to marry the Rev Philip Freeman the younger brother of the Revd. John Freeman, the author of Kirby’s life. This earlier link is probably how Henry’s children came to meet their respective wives from the Gipping Valley in Suffolk.

The close nature of the friendship, and that it was maintained over many years is suggested by the following codicil in William Kirby's will (from the Suffolk Record Office) as follows:

"to my dear friend Ann Maria Baber, daughter of the Revd H. H. Baber late of the British Museum Ten Pounds as a token of my regard" Jan 10th 1844 [7]

William Kirby and his wife Charlotte paid a social visit to Cambridge and Stretham in January 1841. This is recorded in Freeman's Life of Kirby.

“After spending a week at the latter place (Cambridge) and Stretham very pleasantly, we packed ourselves into the Ipswich Coach.”

Edward Stanley, (1779 – 1849) [8] Bishop of Norwich

That the Bishop of Norwich was involved in Harry Baber's early career as a curate is interesting.
Harry Baber's father Henry Hervey Baber occupied a living that was in the Diocese of Ely, and was located within sight of Ely, which was only about six miles from Stretham. However for reasons that are unclear, Harry was ordained by the Bishop of Norwich located much further away.

Botany may well have been the reason for Bishop Edward's interest in Harry Baber's career. The Bishop was a very keen botanist.  He became President of the Linnean Society in 1837, and remained so until his death in 1849.  He was also the original Patron of the Ipswich Museum and presided at its opening in 1847. 

The printed licence from Edward Stanley, (1779 – 1849) [8] Bishop of Norwich appointing Harry Baber to his first curacy is endorsed in handwriting: -

“You residing at Claydon about half a mile distant being allowed to reside out of the parish of Barham aforesaid on account of the Rector being resident in the parsonage house there.”

I am by no means an expert on either botany or on the history of natural philosophy as it was described at the time. If you are aware of other information on this subject, or know more about aspects of the above, I would very much like to hear from you.  My email is balmer.nicholas@gmail.com

---

[1] https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2020/feb/17/gigi-crompton-obituary Mrs Crompton sadly died early in 2020.

[2] Janet Brown, Charles Darwin, Voyaging, pages 117-140.

[3]http://venn.lib.cam.ac.uk/cgi-bin/search-2018.pl?sur=&suro=w&fir=&firo=c&cit=&cito=c&c=all&z=all&tex=BBNN825CC&sye=&eye=&col=all&maxcount=50

See also S.M. Walters & E.A. Stow, Darwin's Mentor, John Stevens Henslow 1796-1861.

[4] The apartments were all located in two wings of red brick buildings that lined either side of the courtyard in front of the museum. Before the existing library was built, these blocks of apartments were demolished. 

[5] See http://herbariaunited.org/forum/viewtopic.php?t=12933

[6]Dermestidae are a family of Coleoptera that are commonly referred to as skin beetles. Other common names include larder beetle, hide or leather beetles, carpet beetles, and khapra beetles. There are approximately 500 to 700 species worldwide.

[7] Doctor Leach who was six years older than Henslow had recognised Henslow's abilities as a naturalist before Henslow went up to Cambridge. It is very possible that Leach would have shown Henslow the botanical collections inside the British Library.

[8] E-mail from Greg Finch 02/2001, original of Kirby’s will in Suffolk Record Office.

[9] Edward Stanley, Bishop of Norwich was also President of the Linnaean Society.

John Baber, Vicar of Great Chesterford (1716-1792)

Great Chesterford Church

For many years, I have been aware that John Baber (1716-1792) was Vicar of Great Chesterford, a village between Cambridge and Saffron Walden in Cambridgeshire. However, until quite recently, I could find only a very little about his life, beyond the theft of his Madder plants that had taken place, and that he had been a pluralist, as were so many of his fellow Church of England clergymen at this time: I had assumed that his life and career was one of quiet contemplation, punctuated the weekly round of services.

However, with the recent appearance of the Church of England Database, [1] and the explosion of information coming available via the Internet, I am finding that his life has considerable interest.

John was the brother of my 5 x great grandfather, Thomas Draper Baber, the fourth son of John Baber 1684 – 1765 of Sunninghill in Berkshire.

John was born shortly before the 4 July 1716 at Sunninghill in Berkshire.

Sunning-Hill Park, Berkshire. [2]

John and Anne had previously had three boys, Thomas Draper Baber, born on the 19th of May 1711, William born on the 2nd of September 1712, however he only lived a short while, dying on the 5th of November that year, and in April 1714, Peregrine was born and baptised on the 4th of the month. A further daughter, Charlotte arrived during August 1718.

They were brought up at Sunninghill Park in Berkshire, which had been inherited by their father on the death of their grandmother in 1719.  Their grandfather had died in August 1718.

We know nothing about John’s upbringing, beyond the fact that in 1722, it was costing his father £100 a year to educate all of his children.  It is probable that John went to Reading school, as had his elder brother Thomas.  John Loveday of Caversham described John’s father as “an admirable Grecian and polite scholar.”

John's father had inherited the estate from his late Grandmother, Mary the daughter of Sir Thomas Draper; however, much of the money had already been spent, and it is probable that John’s father was one of those who lost heavily with the bursting of the South Sea Bubble.

John’s father had been a passionate stag hunter, who also ran a literary spa based around the Wells Inn Public house. The house was run as a spa which became a resort for many of the local gentry, and literary names of the day, including Lord Hervey and Lady Montagu Wortley.

However, family life must have been strained, because on 7^th of July 1727 his parents separated. This must have been a traumatic event for the children. His mother was Lady Anne Stawell, who had married John Baber of Sunninghill on the 28^th of April 1710.

Until the 1720's the marriage had endured, however it was to end in a complex divorce, which in those days entailed the passing of an Act of Parliament. A huge document survives in the National Archives at Kew that sets out John's case for divorce, based on desertion.  Anne was absenting herself to London, and spending £500 a year on dresses and extravagant living.

John's father meanwhile was building sets of farm houses and buildings at £400 on his estate at East Ham for each and spending freely on books, amassing at least 2,500 titles.

When John was 19, he went up to St John’s College Oxford, where he Matriculated on February the 6th 1735 – 6. He took his B.A. there in 1739.

In the following year he was ordained Deacon at Bangor on the 1st June 1740. It is not known what John did for the following six years, but on the 10th of October 1746, John became the domestic chaplain to Edward 4th Baron Stawell of Somerton in Somerset.

Edward 4th Baron Stawell (1685-1755) by Michael Dahl.[4]

Edward, Baron Stowell was the nephew of John's mother Anne. Edward Stawell lived at Hinton Ampner in Hampshire, Aldermaston Court, and occasionally at Somerton in Somerset. It is very probable that he also occupied a house in London as well. It is not possible to say just how much time that John Baber would have spent in his role as domestic chaplain to Baron Stawell, but presumably it must have been a fairly comfortable time.

The Surviving gates to Aldermarston Court.

Stawell's home at Aldermaston, was the closest to to the Baber family home at Sunninghill, and was most probably where John Baber acted as Chaplain to the Baron.  The fact that the Baron felt able to employ John, when his sister Anne had been divorced by John Baber's father, suggests that John and his mother had maintained contact following her divorce.

We don't know where Anne lived after her divorce, but it is very likely that she spent some of her time at Aldermarston. After her death, she was buried in the Baber family vault at Sunninghill Church.

A year or so later, on the 2nd of December 1747, he took his M.A. degree at Cambridge. On the 6th of March 1747-8 he was ordained at Lincoln, and became Rector of Little Chesterford on the 9th of March 1748, and Vicar of Great Chesterford on the 22nd of March 1748.

Little Chesterford Church

While we know that John married Elizabeth Bate Prissick, at present I cannot establish when the marriage took place, or indeed where.  What I have been able to establish is that her father was Codrington John Prissick who came from Carlton in North Yorkshire [5]

Codrington John Prissick had been baptised in 1701 at St Dunstan's in the East End of London. He was the son of Christopher Prissick and Sarah (nee Codrington), who had been married in 1691 in Barbados, where Sarah had been the daughter of one of the major landowning families on the Island at that time.

Codrington Johns' father, Christopher, originated from Carlton in Yorkshire, and was a wealthy merchant, who appears to have lived in London, but then moved back to Carlton before his death in 1718.

Codrington John Prissick was married in 1723, at Whorlton, North Yorkshire, to Elizabeth Perrott [6], daughter of Charles Perrott, sometime Mayor of York, and they had at least 7 children, who were baptised in Carlton between 1724 and 1736.

Codrington John Prissick inherited significant properties from his father in 1718, including the manor of Carlton and its associated Alum mines. 

The Manor House at Carlton, probable childhood home to Elizabeth Prissick.

The alum mines have a particular significance, as Alum could be used not just as part of textile dying process, but was also used extensively for the refining of raw sugar loaves.

It is probably significant that her father was Codrington John Prissick.  The Codrington family under Christopher Codrington (c. 1600-1656) had been amongst the most successful of the pioneering settlers in Barbados. Christopher Codrington married Frances Drax, who had several sons, including John Codrington (c.1642-c.1688) who had married Sarah Bate, daughter of Colonel William Bate of Barbados.

This marriage produced at least five children, including Sarah Codrington, who had married Christopher Prissick of London, parents of Codrington John Prissick.[7]

Former Alum Mines on Carlton Bank, looking north towards Middlesborough

Note how Elizabeth Bate Prissick has as her middle name Bate.  This naming pattern was very common during the 18th Century, with my great x 4 grandfather Samuel Hawkins, a London solicitor and promoter of loans to South Wales mining interests calling his sons by long strings of names including Bennett, Popkin, and after a number of other mining owners who were amongst his clients.

John Baber appears to have suggested this practice to his brother Thomas. John's living at Great Chesterford was within the gift of the Hervey family, major East Anglian landowners, with the result that my 3 x great grandfather was called Henry Hervey Baber, and he had Thomas Hervey Baber, and James Hervey Baber for brothers.

There were many members of the Bate family active in Barbados and Antigua while Elizabeth was a child, and it is probable that one of them was invited to become her Godfather.

Late 19th Century Mapping of Carlton Bank, showing both the former Alum mines,

but also the Jet Workings.

Many early colonial planters tried to vertically integrate their sugar plantations, by using brothers or other close family members to organise the marketing of the sugar in England or to the Continent. Two thirds of the sugar arriving in England was for onward sale to Europe.

It looks as if the Prissick family had repatriated funds to England, and had bought up the Alum mines so that they could supply Alum to the processing works in Antigua where their main plantations were.

The Alum mines at Charlton have been restored over the past 30 years, removing much of the former workings, but as the following image shows, their effect on the landscape is still clearly to be seen from the following aerial photograph.

Alum and Jet Mines on Charlton Bank.  

The village is situated in the plain to the north of the escarpment.

Because it is not at all clear where Elizabeth and John were married, and because a gap of about five years exists in John's documentation, it is entirely possible that John had made the voyage to the West Indies, and this may have been where they met.

John Baber's father had spent some of his childhood in Spain, and when his library was sold in 1766, it contained what was then the largest collection of Spanish and Italian books in England. These included a number of titles on the Spanish colonies in South America and the Spanish Main.  John's brother Peregrine Baber had been a member of the expeditionary force sent to the West Indies as a officer in the Marines where he had taken part in the ill fated siege of Cartagena in 1746.  The regiment of Marines Peregrine served had been was raised with recruits from Hartlepool and South Shields.

It does appear however that not all was well, with Elizabeth's father as the properties were passed on to his Uncle John Prissick during the 1740's.

By October 1746, John was active and appears in the records in England once again.

Appointed Vicar of Great Chesterford on the 22nd of March 1748, he now had two parishes to run, situated a little over a mile apart.  Great Chesterford was not situated on the main London to Cambridge road, although these were not far removed. It was however on the main London to Newmarket route, much used by crowds visiting the horse races. As such the village was well supplied with pubs and inns.

Interior of Great Chesterford Church.

As far as we can tell John and Elizabeth Baber lived in Great Chesterford for the next twenty years. There is no record of their having had any children, and it is not entirely clear where in the village they lived.  There are at least three former vicarages in the village. One in the grounds of the other two, which is a modern post 1970's vicarage, while the second larger one behind the church appears both too recent for the family to have lived in, as well as too large.

Next to the church gate is the "Old Vicarage" which appears to have a considerable amount of 15th Century, or possibly earlier woodwork in its structure.

I believe that this is most likely to have been the house that was the home to John and Elizabeth Baber.

The Old Vicarage, Great Chesterford. 

The Church gate can be seen to the right of the photo.

Codrington John Prissick died in 1753, at which time he was living in York. The administration of his estate was granted in that year. A possible clue to the loss of his property being that the administration was granted to his principal creditor, a Joseph Hawksworth of the City of York, a Wine & Spirit Merchant. [8]

Ockley's History of the Saracens.

One of the frustrations of historical research into ones ancestors, is that it is very hard to find out what caught their interest.  In the case of John Baber, we get a tantalising glimpse from the fact that he was interested enough in Islam and the rise of the Saracen Empire to buy Simon Ockley's book, The History of the Saracen's. The book had been written in about 1708 by Ockley who was Vicar of Swavesey and was appointed professor of Arabic in 1711.  Ockley who fell into debt was imprisoned in Cambridge Castle in 1718, and had died in 1720.  The life of Mohammed was added by Roger Long who reissued the book in 1757 as a way of relieving the distress Ockley's destitute daughter was in. Perhaps this is why John bought the book. Perhaps he was aware of her plight.

The subscription page for surnames beginning with B.

Aged 47, on the 3rd of March 1763 John became Chaplain to Robert Carteret, 3rd Earl of Granville (1721-1776). Robert Carteret had succeeded to his father’s title on the death of the latter on the 2nd of January 1763.

Robert Carteret, 3rd Earl of Granville (1721-1776) by John Smart [9]

It is not clear why John Baber should have wished to take up this post, however the Carteret family, who came originally from the island of Jersey, had owned a mainland property at Sunninghill in Berkshire for most of the previous hundred years, and as such must have known the Baber family.
 

Robert Carteret was the only surviving son of John Carteret, 2nd Earl of Granville. He is described as being of weak intellect, although through influence he had been secured a seat as MP for Yarmouth on the Isle of Wight in December 1744. An unsuccessful attempt had been made to have him adopted as a candidate for Cornwall in April 1744.

Elizabeth Wyndham wrote in 1744:

"Young Carteret has been at Wooburn, where he has raised the Devil in a manner so indecent that I cannot give you details. The Duke has told his father that he ought to have him put under control, for his head appears to be turned, as it may well be, for he drinks brandy from morning till night."

On 16 Aug. 1744 Horace Walpole wrote to Mann:

“About a fortnight ago he was at the Duke of Bedford’s and as much in his few senses as ever. At five o’clock in the morning he waked the Duke and Duchess all bloody and with the lappet of his coat held up full of ears; he had been in the stable and cropped all the horses.”

It is possible that John Baber was being expected to try to exercise some control on a less than rational being, who had lost any restraint his later father might have tried to impose.

20 years later, and at about the time John Baber became his Chaplain, Elizabeth Montagu wrote of him:

"It is grievous to see such a creature represent the late Earl, who had all the grace and dignity of manner added to great talents".

Robert Carteret had had a mistress for over forty years who was called Elizabeth, and was probably of French origin.  He eventually married her, but died without heirs.

Elizabeth, Lord Carteret's Daughter?

The National Gallery of Victoria has a second portrait of “Lord Carteret’s Daughter” also by John Smart. Robert Carteret is not believed to have had any heirs. Was this a daughter who died before him, or is this really a portrait of his mistress?

It is quite possible that it was John Baber’s role to try to moderate Robert Carteret’s extremes, but if this was the case, he does not seem to have been at all successful, because another contemporary report described Carteret in 1776 as:

"rather deficient in his intellects, fond of low company, profuse, fickle and debauched. He appeared constantly in the mean garment of a groom or coachman, shunning his equals, and rioting in taverns with pimps and prostitutes. The conclusion of his inglorious amours was a Fleet marriage with one Molly Paddock, a woman of vile extraction, bold, loose and vulgar, the superintendent of a bagnio".[10]

Along with his estates in England and on Jersey, Robert Carteret had inherited a large amount of land in North Carolina from his father.

When in London, Carteret appears to have lived at 3 New Burlington Street in London from 1764 to 1775, where presumably John Baber must have ministered to him.[11]

Carteret also inherited Hawnes Park, in Bedfordshire situated in the village of Haynes, which was about 35 miles due west of Great Chesterford.

Hawnes Park, in Bedfordshire situated in the village of Haynes.

We don't know how John Baber divided his time between his duties for Lord Carteret and his parochial responsibilities. Presumably he employed curates to minister to the villagers at Chesterford.

There is an interesting possible indicator both of the fact that with the vicar spending less time in the village, the locals felt that they could help themselves to his property.

Madder Roots, used to make red dyes.

ESSEX

CHESTERFORD, Jan. 7, [1764]

Whereas a small Plantation of MADDER, containing near a Quarter of an Acre, lying in the Parish of Little Chesterford in the County of Essex, and belonging to the Rev. John Baber, has been robbed of a considerable Quantity of Plants and Roots, to the great Detriment of the Owner; this is to give Notice, that anybody who will inform against the Person or Persons who have robbed the said Plantation, so that he, she, or they, may be lawfully convicted there- of, shall receive the Reward of Ten Pounds, by the said J. BABER. [12]

John Baber's signature.

In amongst a set of family autographs collected, very probably by my five times great grandfather Thomas Draper Baber, are two signatures from two documents dating from February 1766. This was the year when his father's estate at Sunninghill was being broken up and sold. Nearly a hundred years of their family life was being dispersed.

John Baber's second signature.

In 1770, Christopher Prissick, Elizabeth's brother died at Havannah in Cuba.

Havannah at about the period HMS Rippon and Christopher Prissick arrived there.

Christopher Prissick's will gives interesting detail of her wider family.

Prerogative Court Canterbury, Admons:

8 March 1770

Adm granted to.. 

- Hannah Gisborne (wife of Thomas William Gisborne) the daughter and admr of William Gyles decd (who whilst living was a creditor of the said decd)
- Elizabeth Prissick, widow, natl and lawful mother and next of kin
- Elizabeth Bate Baber (wife of the rev John Baber) and Hannah Rennie, widow, natl & lawful sisters
- Elizabeth Prissick, spinster, niece of the said decd having renounced and Ann Prissick, spinster, Codrington Charles Prissick, Thomas Prissick & Bate Hannah Prissick, spinster, the nephew & nieces of the said decd having also renounced by Elizabeth Prissick widow their natural and lawful mother and curatrix or guardian lawfully assigned.

With his previous employer dead, aged 60, and possibly finding parish duties too much, John obtained a new post as domestic chaplain, and then resigned his livings at Great and Little Chesterford.

On the 1st April 1776 John became domestic chaplain to David Kennedy, 10th Earl of Cassilis (c. 1734-1792.) The Earl of Cassilis estates lay near Alloway south of the River Doon. His home was at Culzean Castle, which he re-built, commissioning Robert Adam as his architect. The cost of the re-building greatly exceeded the Earl’s income, and by the time of his death he owed £60,000 to his creditors.

Culzean Castle built in stages between 1777 and 1792

Again, we face the frustration of not knowing how much time each year John had to spend with the Earl, or indeed where the Earl himself was living.  Presumably with the Castle being substantially re-built throughout much of this period, the Earl and by implication his chaplain must have only visited the site of Robert Adams work.

James Boswell described the Earl of Cassillis as ”a good honest merry fellow.”

Before succeeding to the Earldom, David Kennedy had worked as an advocate living at Newark.

In June 1776, the following notice appeared in the Ipswich Journal.

The Rev. Edward Waterson, B. A. is presented by the Earl of Bristol to the vicarage of Great Chesterford in Essex, void by the promotion of the Rev. Mr. Baber.[13]

Possibly with a view to retaining a living in the South of England in the event that his employer died, or his role came to an end, John took the living of Little Chishall which is about nine miles west of Chesterford, set into the folds of the Chiltern escarpment, not far from Royston.

John became Rector of Little Chishall on 13^th May 1776 and remained in that post until his death in 1792.

St Nicholas Church, Little Chishall.

The village of Little Chishall is very sparsely populated even today, and John's parish duties cannot have been onerous. It is probable that for most of the year he lived with the Earl of Cassillis as part of the Earl's household, and that he employed a curate to take the services in Chishall.

The Rectory, Little Chishall.

By  1782, Thomas Draper Baber, John's brother had taken a house in Newton, a village about nine miles due north of Little Chishall.

A map showing the locations of Great Chesterford, Little Chishall and Newton

In 1792 during his seventeenth-year Henry Hervey Baber recorded: -

“Went in July with my fath sic. (to) Great Chesterford and staid there 2 days in which time the Rev.d John Baber died aged 75.”[14] 

An entry in the diary of Henry Hervey Baber's recording the death of the Rev'd John Baber.

What is interesting, is that it shows that John had returned to Great Chesterford for his final years. Little Chishall was such a small village, that it must have been very isolated. 

It is unknown where John is buried. As late as 1827, it was hoped to bury Thomas Baber in the family vault at Sunninghill, but this provided not to be possible at the time because the church was being re-built in that year. It is quite possible that John was placed into the family vault at Sunninghill, as there is no obvious monument to him at Great Chesterford.

Great Chesterford Graveyard, the dates on several gravestones

 are those people who must have been his parishioners

A curious entry in the Clergy Database suggests that on the 22 February 1793 John had become Curate of St George Hanover Square, however this must be a mistake as he had died in the previous year.

The River Cam at Great Chesterford.

If you should stumble onto this blog perhaps because you are researching the history of your village or family, and you recognise any of the people and places named, please do not hesitate to contact me.

I am particularly trying to fill in the gap during the 1740's. Can you find John and Elizabeth, perhaps in the West Indies? Or perhaps you are aware of where in England they were?

Do you know of any accounts of visits to the homes of  Edward 4th Baron Stawell, Robert Carteret, 3rd Earl of Granville, or the Earl of Cassillis as I would love to be able to establish how John Baber fitted in his role with these domestic chaplain posts and those in his parishes.

I can be contacted at balmer.nicholas@gmail.com

[1] http://db.theclergydatabase.org.uk/jsp/persons/DisplayCcePerson.jsp?PersonID=114947

[2] From http://www.berkshirehistory.com/castles/images/sunninghill_park.jpg

[3] http://db.theclergydatabase.org.uk/jsp/persons/CreatePersonFrames.jsp?PersonID=114947

[4] National Trust, Hinton Ampner.

[5] In Cleveland since the changes to the County Boundaries during the 1970's.

[6] http://www.davekinggenealogy.co.uk/Resources/f10.htm

[7] See Matthew Parker's book, The Sugar Barons, for simplified family trees, and much much more on the Codrington, Prissick, Drax and Bate families. Published 2011.

[8] “In February 2003, we received the following information from Mr David King who came across the Societies website whilst researching one of his Ancestors; Codrington John Prissick, Captain of the Arrow in 1726.  From http://www.scortonarrow.com/vol00/popupcap1726.htm”

[9] http://content.ngv.vic.gov.au/col-images/api/Ff003455/xxl

[10] http://www.theislandwiki.org/index.php/Robert_Carteret

[11]http://www.british-history.ac.uk/survey-london/vols31-2/pt2/pp566-572#highlight-first

[12] The Ipswich Journal- Saturday 21 January 1764.

[13] The Ipswich Journal - Saturday 29 June 1776.

[14] From “Memoranda relating the life of Henry Hervey Baber”, a handwritten diary of H H Baber’s life.

Riots at Little Thetford, Rector in peril getting to Even Song

Little Thetford Church Yard

It seems hard to imagine it now, but in 1833, this church yard and quiet village was the scene of a pitched battle between the villagers and the Constabulary.  When on the following evening my three x great grandfather, the Rev'd Henry Hervey Baber arrived to take the service, the villagers at once tried to prevent his entering the church in protest.

On the 16th of November 1833 a notice had appeared in the local press, announcing the intention of the promoters to apply for an Act of Parliament to enclose the common lands of Stretham and Little Thetford.  In order to do this a number of legal formalities had had to be undertaken including pinning notices to the Church doors of the villages concerned, and the solicitors clerks set out to Stretham and Little Thetford to post the notices. At Stretham this seems to have happened with no immediate repercussions.

However at Little Thetford, perhaps forwarded by the appearance of the notice on Stretham Church door, when Thomas Archer and his clerks arrived they found a dozen villagers who were opposed enclosure waiting for them, each armed with bludgeons, who prevented the official getting to the church door, determined to prevent the posting of the legal notice.

The clerks retired thwarted in their intention, to Ely where they went to visit the local magistrates, who ordered ten constables to accompany the clerks to see that the job was completed.

It must have seemed to the magistrates that ten constables would have been more than a match for the original twelve villagers, however by the time they arrived back in the village they found that they were confronted not by twelve, but one hundred and fifty protesters, all of whom were armed with sticks.

This must have been just about every adult male from this small village, and quite possibly other protesters from surrounding communities had joined in.

Here is a copy of the notice that had appeared in several local news papers, including the Huntingdon, Bedford & Peterborough Gazette and the Cambridge Chronicle and Journal. 

            Huntingdon, Bedford and Peterborough Gazette - Saturday 16 November 1833

The notice read as follows, and its text must have been very similar to that, which it had been intended to post onto the church door.

STRETHAM-CUM-THETFORD. 

NOTICE is hereby Given, that Application is intended to made in the next Session of Parliament for leave to bring in a bill for dividing, allotting, inclosing, and draining the several Open Fields, Commons, Meadow and Commonable Lands and Waste Grounds within the parish of Stretham and hamlet of Thetford, in the Isle of Ely and County of Cambridge, and such portions of fen called Grunty Fen, in the said Isle and County, (being an intercommon between the said parish and hamlet, and the parishes of Wilburton, Haddenbam, Wentworth, Witchford, and Saint Mary, in Ely, in the said Isle and County, or some of them) as may be equal in value to the rights and interests of the several commoners and inhabitants of the said parish of Stretham and hamlet of Thetford over the same: and for exonerating from tithes the said fields, com mons, lands, and waste grounds, and the said portions of the aforesaid fen, and all other the titheable lands and properties within the said parish of Stretham and hamlet of Thetford. And that is intended to make provision in the said Bill for appropriating for the exclusive benefit and enjoyment of the Poor Inhabitants of the said parish of Stretham and hamlet of Thetford. certain parts of the said fen or of the said commons. And Notice is further Given, that provision is also intended to be made in the said Bill for altering, amending, or repealing an act passed in the sixth year of the reign of His Majesty King George the third, entitled, "An Act for draining and preserving Stretham Common in the Isle of Ely "and County of Cambridge; and for empowering " the Commissioners for putting in Execution an Act for the effectual draining and preservation of Waterbeach Level in the County Cambridge, and to establish an Agreement made between the Lord of the Manor of Waterbeach-cum-Denny and the Commoners within the said Manor, to raise Sum " of Money to pay the Debts owing upon the Credit "of the said Act." And that provision will also be made in the said Bill for embanking, draining, and preserving, as well such of the said commons and meadow and commonable lands as may require to be embanked and drained, as also certain low lands situate within the said hamlet of Thetford, and parish of the Holy-Trinity in Ely, and the parish of Saint Mary in Ely, and between certain bank, called Cawdle-Fen Bank, and a certain common, called Hall-Fen Common, and certain other low lands and grounds situate within the said hamlet, called Reed Fen and Langmore grounds.—Dated this eighth day of November, 1833.

By Order,

EVANS, ARCHER, and EVANS, Solicitors.

Huntingdon, Bedford and Peterborough Gazette - Saturday 16 November 1833

Eventually the police withdrew bruised, however the villagers remained on watch until midnight.

The next afternoon, being a Sunday, the Rector, Henry Hervey Baber, arrived to conduct the service of Evensong, and the watchers resisted his approach to the Church, “No church today” they shouted, however the rector persisted and was eventually able to enter the Church with his church warden, who had been one of the protesting crowd. [1]

The objections to the inclosure act was not just coming from the poorest of the villagers, but from a vocal and well organised group of villagers who appear to have including many of the tenant farmers. 

They were sufficiently well organised to be able to publish their own advertisements in the local press objecting to the inclosures.  The following fascinating advertisement names many of those who must have taken part in the demonstration and fracas in the street at Little Thetford.

Friday 22nd of November 1833,  Cambridge Chronicle and Journal 

The Rector was at this time relatively new in the living, having been presented to it in 1827, as a reward for his efforts in publishing the facsimile of the Alexander Codex, and to supplement his salary as Keeper of the Printed Books at the British Library.  This meant that until 1835 when he resigned his post at the Library, he can have only been present in the villages of Stretham for parts of the year, and that he must have employed curates to read the services in his place. 

Revd Henry Hervey Baber, Rector of Stretham Cum Thetford.

It was probably because those involved in the affray were in many cases substantial farmers and villagers, that the magistrates appear to have been very restrained in their treatment of those involved when they came before the bench in Ely.

STRETHAM CUM-THETFORD INCLOSURE.

In consequence of the extreme unpopularity of the proposed inclosure among the small commoners, attempts to post the notices church doors in each place was resisted. At Stretham, however, a notice was eventually posted; but at Thetford the whole population rallied, from the farmer to the servant, with their wives and children - all were in readiness to resist the posting of the notice in arms.

Mr. Thomas Archer, one of the solicitors for the bill, attended by a host of constables, sworn in for the occasion, was successfully resisted. It is but right to state that their resistance was as peaceable as, under the circumstances, might be expected. An information against eleven of the inhabitants was heard before the magistrates at Ely, on Thursday last, when all the parties were discharged upon entering into recognizances. The excitement was beyond all precedent, and particularly as regards Grunty Fen, which belongs to nearly all the surrounding parishes. The attempt to inclose Grunty Fen, some fifty years ago, brought forward an opposition nearly amounting to a riot.

Huntingdon, Bedford and Peterborough Gazette - Saturday 30 November 1833

The Main Street in Little Stretham, opposite the church. Presumably the site of the struggle with the Constabulary.

Why were the villagers so exercised by the proposals to inclose the land?

The Fens and especially the Isle of Ely had a long tradition of resistance to outsiders, going back to at least Hereward the Wake. Oliver Cromwell had lived in Ely, and was well aware of the popular resistance to the drainage of the Fens during the 1830's.

The Fens to the east and north of Stretham were amongst the deepest and most waterlogged, so that they remained as marshland until much later than more accessible and less deep areas had first been reclaimed.

Nearby Wicken Fen represents the closest that we can get today to seeing what the land around Little Thetford and Stretham was like in 1833.

The land was covered in marshland, reeds and wet land woods, which was seasonally flooded each Winter and in wet periods.  In the Summer months it was dry enough over much of its area for cattle to be fed in the marshes. The reeds were cut and sold for many miles inland for thatching houses, and year round there was a rich harvest of fresh water fish and wildfowl. Rents were generally low.

The following photo taken recently at the National Trust's reserve at Wickham Fen, which is being returned to its former wetland status, gives a very good idea of what the landscape around Little Thetford and Stretham looked like before the drainage. Cattle including Highland Cattle were droved as two and three year olds from Scotland and the North West of England to markets where local farmers would buy them, each year to turn out on the summer grazing.  These cattle, previously only used to sparse upland vegetation, would rapidly fatten ready for onward droving first to St Ives market, and then London in time for the Christmas markets. 

Modern Highland Cattle at Wicken Fen

Surprisingly examples of the former vegetation that was living and growing at Stretham and from the surrounding Fens at this very time survive in the Botanical Libraries of Edinburgh and Cambridge in the form of pressed plants and flowers.

They demonstrate the former marshy situation that they grew in.  The samples were taken in the 1830's by Henry Hervey Baber's son Harry Baber, who was a student of Theology at nearby Cambridge University. Whilst studying there he had been very interested in botany, and had studied under the Rev Philip Henslow, who had been one of Darwin's tutors.  Harry's father was also responsible for the British Libraries botanical collection, which later on, would be separated out and formed the core of the future National History Museum.  This sample was one of a number of aquatic plant species that Harry sent to the Botanical Collection at Edinburgh University, where they have recently been photographed as part of their digitising of their collections.

Carex Hirta (Hairy Sedge) collected by Harry Baber at Stretham in 1838.

It had become possible to drain and convert the land to arable uses by drainage because of the advances in steam pumping engines that had been taking place in the previous decade.  In 1831 a very large pumping engine had been built to the east of Stretham, which still survives. A Mr Glynn had been commissioned in 1829 to develop a proposal for this very large new pumping station.  By 1831, complete with its 75 feet tall chimney it was brought into service.[2]

The beam engine had been manufactured by the Butterley Company and must have taken a considerable effort to move from Derbyshire to Stretham and to erect.

Stretham Steam Pumping Station.

The cost of the coal for the pumping station was met by levying a tax per acre onto the land of the surrounding parishes, and these added financial burdens put pressure on farmers and graziers who didn't have the capital to invest in hedging and draining their individual farms.

An extract of the Ordnance Survey map of Little Thetford circa 1890.

Although this map shows the later railway, and indeed the field boundaries and drains installed following the inclosures, it still show the names of the former boundaries, including in this case Thetford Cow Common.  As can be seen the common extended over the site of many local fields laid out in 1837.  Before the inclosures the villagers held the Common Rights "in Common" and were each able to turn out a set number of cattle onto the Common, so that many cows from the village would all be grazing together.  With the inclosure acts all of this was done away with.  By the time the Act was proposed at Stretham and Little Thetford enclosure Acts had previously been enacted in many other villagers, so that the villagers were under few illusions as to what to expect.

The open and potentially dangerous nature of the land at Little Thetford prior to its draining is illustrated by the fate of a drover returning to Ely who had lost his way in 1830. Stretham and Little Thetford were on the main London to Ely and Kings Lynn Road.  Both villages were situated on low islands that were raised just above the surrounding marshland, and in wet weather with the floods out, it must have been easy to become confused. The route north into Ely involved crossing several deep drains.

Friday 26 February 1830 Cambridge Chronicle and Journal

A modern map showing the location of Little Thetford relative to Ely and Stretham

Cambridge is about ten miles to the south of the map.

The Rector found himself caught up in the resentment for many reasons.  The primary one was that the farmers had to pay tithes to the Rector, and these represented a substantial amount of their annual income.  In many cases the same farmers were Dissenters, or Non-Comformists, and as such they disliked supporting the Established Church.  The issue became really complicated, because in most cases, the Inclosure Act was intended amongst other things, to compound for the tithes by allotting the Rector an area of Glebe Lands with which in future he would be able to grow his own income, and the villagers would no longer have to pay him tithes.

There was also the issue of Puralism, or absentee parsons. Throughout the 18th Century the religious fervour and rigour than had applied in the 17th Century fell away, and with so did church attendances.  Many of the richest parishes also came to belong to institutions like the Oxford & Cambridge Colleges.  The incomes from these parishes became dedicated to the support of academics in those Colleges, and the incumbents rarely ever visited their parishes in person.

A very telling letter appeared in the local Huntingdon, Bedford & Peterborough Gazette complaining about this situation.  Oddly enough the Rector of Stretham is singled out as being one of the few who did at least attend his parish, if only for part of the year.

Saturday 20 September 1834, Huntingdon, Bedford and Peterborough Gazette

In Henry Hervey Baber's case he had been given the living specifically to support his income because his salary from the British Library was too low.  By externalising the cost the Board of the Library were able to avoid raising their budget.  In 1834 Henry would give evidence at the Royal Commission saying that it was no longer acceptable that the Keeper of the Printed Books be a pluralist, and that the salary should be increased.

He also handed in his notice, and retired to Stretham.

Friday 21 August 1835, Cambridge Chronicle and Journal

The actual process of inclosure seems to have taken nearly a decade to implement.  It caused a large scale reorganisation of the entire landscape, and required many families to commit to major fencing and drainage works.

The Fence and Ditches from the Inclosure Award are evident in this 1890's map.

Many of the meetings to arrange the work of dividing up the parish lands took place in the Lamb Inn in Ely, which survives to this day. Did the Rector attend along with the other villagers?

The Lamb Inn, Ely.

Here is an example of one such meeting called at the Lamb in the following notice published in the Cambridge Chronicle in November 1835.

Friday 20 November 1835, Cambridge Chronicle and Journal

Before the Inclosure, the individual farmers land had generally been interleaved with that of many others. In future it would be combined into contiguous blocks wherever possible.  The other boundary fences were erected by the Commissioners who were undertaking the Inclosure, but in due course they would charge the farmers for it.  Many of the roads were also realigned, and until these could be rebuilt, this must have reduced the roads to an absolute mud fest until such time as they could be surfaced.

The villagers themselves were responsible for this road making. It was generally done in winter using labourers and their families who had been reduced to dependency on the Poor Law.  To get the stones, they were expected very often to stone pick the newly ploughed soil, which can have been no fun at all throughout the winter months, carrying the stones in sacks or baskets across the fields to the dump in the newly fenced lanes. Here is an advertisement for the fencing work.

Saturday 15 October 1836, Huntingdon, Bedford and Peterborough Gazette

By 1837, the bulk of the work had been completed on the enclosures, and the formal award was announced, with the lands being handed out.

STRETHAM INCLOSURE. 

WE, the Commissioners acting under and by virtue of Act of Parliament passed in the 5th and 6th years of the reign of his late Majesty King William the Fourth, entitled "An Act for inclosure and allotting lands in the Parish of Stretham, the Isle of Ely and "county of Cambridge, and for the Commutation " of Tithes," do hereby give notice, that we shall hold a SPECIAL GENERAL MEETING at the Lamb Inn, in Ely, on Wednesday the sixth day of September next, at ten o’clock the forenoon, for the purpose of reading over and executing our Award in the presence of such the Proprietors as may think proper attend, and of transacting any other business relative the said Inclosure that require our attention.—Dated this 17th day of August, 1837.

JOHN JOSSELYN.

ANTHy. JACKSON.

For many of the smaller farmers, whose allotments were often too small to adequately support their families the effects were dire. With the land no longer held at least in part as common land, and with it all fenced off, it was no longer as easy to forage as it had been in earlier years.  With the land increasingly drained, there was much less opportunity for fishing or wild fowling to supplement the pot.

Many of the farms were sold in the following years, and the ownership of land was consolidated into the hands of many fewer larger farmers.  Many smallholders who had previously eked out a living, working seasonally on the holdings of the larger farmers, and who grew subsistence crops or foraged to supplement their incomes became dependent on the parish.

As I will show in a future blog, this led to an unfortunate series of events in Stretham, that would affect both the Rector, but also many of the villagers profoundly. 

[1] I acknowledge the assistance of  Steve Skerry who wrote an excellent leaflet and notice board in 1995, which appears inside Little Thetford Church setting out these events.

[2] See http://strethamoldengine.org.uk/history.htm.  The pumping station is open at weekends and public holidays, but it is advisable to check with the trusts website before you set out for the details of opening days and times.

The newspaper extracts all come from the excellent British Library online Newspaper Archive, without which this blog would be far less interesting, if indeed possible.