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From Soldier to Peasant? The Land Settlement Scheme in East Sussex, 1919—1939

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  20 November 2017

Carol A. Lockwood
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Extract

The English rural myth suggested that being close to the rhythms of nature, as opposed to being immersed in the irritations and pollution of city life, would create a settled, healthy, content, and loyal population. By the inter-war period the rural myth depicted an appealing image of self-sufficient, independent peasants living an uncomplicated lifestyle based on agricultural pursuits. In the aftermath of the First World War this picture of a golden countryside was popular and admired by social reformers, members of the government, and the general public. The coalition government incorporated this myth into its post-war social legislation and created in 1919 a land settlement scheme for newly demobilized soldiers aimed at establishing a new base of smallholding agricultural workers to populate the countryside. The myth may have been appealing, but it turned out to be economically not self-sustaining and politically it got little more than lip service. A myth cannot be attained through mere legislation. This article examines the land settlement scheme in East Sussex during the inter-war period and argues that even in an area seemingly well-suited to such a program, the scheme was neither practical nor successful in its attempt to put the myth into practice.

Type
Research Article
Information
Albion , Volume 30 , Issue 3 , Fall 1998 , pp. 439 - 462
Copyright
Copyright © North American Conference on British Studies 1998

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Footnotes

*

An earlier version of this article was presented at the North American Conference on British Studies, Washington, D.C., October 1995. I am grateful to the panel participants for their encouragement and to Albion’s editor and anonymous readers for their criticism and suggestions on drafts of this article.

References

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24 Enfield, Agricultural Crisis, pp. 63, 65, 77, 98; Hall, Reconstruction and the Land, p. 40; Whetham, “The Agricultural Act,” pp. 45—49; Ministry of Works and Planning, Report of the Committee on Land Utilisation in Rural Areas, Cmd. 6378 (1942), p. 15.

25 Stamp, Land of Britain, p. 355; PRO, Kew, MAF 68/3208, Agricultural Returns for Sussex.

26 ESRO, C/C11/59/13, East Sussex Agricultural Committee, Cultivation and Land Drainage Sub-Committee, 21 Oct. 1927, 26 Oct. 1928; 1930—1939.

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35 ESRO, C/C11/21/6, Smallholdings and Allotments Committee, Auction Sub-Committee Minute Book 1919—1921.

36 Ibid., 8 April 1919; 27 January 1920; East Sussex Smallholdings and Allotments Committee, Auction Sub-committee minutes, 8 April 1919.

37 ESRO, C/C11/21/6, Auction Sub-Committee; C/C 11/21/7, Selection Sub-Committee; C/C11/59/4, Small Holdings and Allotments Sub-Committee; C/C 11/59/8, General Purposes Sub-Committee; C/J1/8, Annual Reports on County Smallholdings; C/J2/14, Hole and Alchome Farm, Nutley.

38 ESRO, C/C11/59/4, Smallholdings and Allotments Sub-Committee Minutes.

39 ESRO, C/C75/4, General File on Land Settlement.

40 ESRO, C/C11/21/7, Selection Sub-Committee; C/C11/59/7, Selection Sub-Committee.

41 Cmd. 2815, Agricultural Output of England and Wales, 1925, p. x.

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43 ESRO, C/C11/21/7 Selection Sub-Committee, 2 Sept. 1919, 14 Sept. 1920; C/C4/59/4, Small Holdings and Allotments Committee, 29 Sept. 1922.

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45 Ibid.

46 ESRO, C/C75/5 General Files on Land Settlement for Ex-servicemen.

47 The Sussex Express, 30 Oct. 1925.

48 ESRO, C/C11/59/4, Smallholdings and Allotments Sub-Committee Minutes; C/J1/1, 8, 12, 18, Annual Reports on County Smallholdings.

49 Ibid.

50 C/C11/59/8, General Purposes Sub-Committee, 23 Oct. 1925, 11 Dec. 1925, 28 May 1926.

51 Mingay, A Social History, p. 217; Simon Miller, “Urban Dreams and Rural Reality: Land and Landscape in English Culture, 1920—45,” Rural History 6, 1 (April 1995): 94; Wiener, Martin, English Culture and the Decline of the Industrial Spirit, 1850—1980 (Penguin, 1981), pp. 6—7Google Scholar, 100—01; Douglas, Land, People and Politics, pp. 194—96.

52 ESRO, C/J1/1, 12, 18, Annual Reports on County Smallholdings for 1929, 1933, 1936; C/J3/2, Smallholdings Registers, “Casualties-Changes in Tenancies.”

53 ESRO, C/C11/59/4, 25 March 1927; C/C11/59/7, 4 March 1927, 20 Jan. 1928.

54 Ibid., 30 Sept. 1927, 5 Oct. 1928, 4 Oct. 1929.

55 ESRO, C/C11/21/4 Small Holdings and Allotments Sub-Committee, 1 October 1926; C/C11/59/8, General Purposes Sub-Committee, 16 September 1927, 2 March 1928.

56 ESRO, C/J1/1, 8, 12, 18, Annual Reports on County Smallholdings. Even the large poultry industry, a mainstay of agriculture in the region, experienced a decline. The number of chickens, which peaked at 24,000 in 1934, fell to 13,000 by 1939.

57 ESRO, C/J1/1, 8, 12, 18, Annual Reports on Smallholdings.

58 ESRO, C/C11/21/4 Small Holdings and Allotments Sub-Committee, 1 October 1926; C/C11/59/8, General Purposes Sub-Committee, 16 September 1927, 2 March 1928.

59 ESRO, C/J1/1, 8, 12, 18, Annual Reports on County Small Holdings, 1922, 1929, 1933, 1939.

60 Chesterton, G. K., The Outline of Sanity(New York, 1927)Google Scholar; Cronin, A. J., The Stars Look Down (London,1935)Google Scholar. There are numerous books and articles of the inter-war years that discuss the recreational and residential aspects of the countryside. For example, see Williams-Ellis, Clough, ed., Britain and the Beast (London, 1938) and idem, , England and the Octopus (Portmeirion, 1928)Google Scholar; Joad, C. E. M., The Horrors of the Countryside (London, 1931)Google Scholar.

61 Joad, C. E. M., “The Peoples’ Claim,” in Williams-Ellis, Britain and the Beast, p. 67Google Scholar.

62 Massingham, H. J., “Our Inheritance from the Past,” in Williams-Ellis, , Britain and the Beast, p. 11—36Google Scholar.