Agricultural History Review, Volume 69 Part 2 (2021), p. 308

This lavishly illustrated full-colour book traces the history of agriculture in the Hampshire village of East Meon, starting in the Mesolithic period and ending with the present day. It would appear that this book has been written for the coffee table, rather than the academic bookshelf, in that there are no footnotes, endnotes, or bibliography: the only references are a series of research studies written by members of the East Meon History Group which are available as PDF documents on their website (https://www.eastmeonhistory.net/ftv/), the majority having been prepared by the editor of the book. However, within these studies, there are numerous references to relevant primary and secondary sources.

Starting from before the Roman invasion, the chapter on Early Farming revisits widely understood descriptions of agriculture in England: indeed, the same is true of the chapters on the Roman and Anglo-Saxon periods, although it does note that the best evidence for historic crops does not survive in the chalk-based soils of East Meon. Rather than providing evidence from the village to support these generalizations, it offers limited examples from within East Meon and its landscape.

Moving forward to the medieval period, the chapter starts with the Domesday survey and the two entries for Menes Hundred and Manor, and for Menes Ecclesia: both belonged primarily to the Bishop of Winchester, until some land was made over to Magdalen College, Oxford, in 1480. Here the Winchester Pipe Rolls have been used as evidence and the farming economy is presented in relation to markets, fairs, mills, and blacksmiths: the possible location and extent of fishponds and the deer park are described, before considering the effect of the Black Death on the village.

Farming in the early modern period uses evidence from a 1567 rental and the 1586 Lay Subsidy list, concluding that the layout of the village had changed little from the Domesday survey. Regarding enclosure by agreement, the only surviving record relates to the tithing of Oxenbourne in 1661. In this chapter, the surviving physical evidence of historic farm buildings is presented, in terms of barns, granaries, stables, cowhouses and cart sheds: here the input from Edward Roberts, expert on Hampshire buildings, is acknowledged.

The chapter on the nineteenth century focuses on the enclosures enacted in 1845, along with the 1851/2 Tithe Award: geo-referenced mapping is used to determine the parish land associated with each village farm in 1851/2, some 26 in number. Data is also taken from the 1851 Census to enrich the description of the farming landscape of East Meon. Village life is described through the development of non-conformism in the village, as well as the move away from self-sufficiency to a dependence on goods available in shops which came to the High Street in East Meon. One particular incident from this period is described at length: in 1826, a new vicar came to the parish and attempted to increase the lesser tithes due to him, by tithing turnips used as animal feed. The squire made a stand on behalf of all farmers in the valley and the vicar took the squire to court, concluding at Lincoln’s Inn Fields, where it was determined that turnips were indeed subject to tithe. However, the squire’s cousin was elected to Parliament in 1835 and raised the matter in the House: whether influential or not, the Tithe Commutation Act received Royal Assent in the following year.

The migration of farmers from Cumberland to East Meon is then described in the following chapter: the book states that it was possible in the 1890s to rent a Hampshire farm of 400 to 500 acres for the same price as 40 to 80 acres in the Lake District. Between 1892 and 1925, nine farming families moved from Cumberland to East Hampshire. These farmers changed the farms from corn growing to livestock husbandry, both sheep and beef cattle: they introduced machinery to make vast quantities of hay and abandoned the practice of folding sheep on turnips using hurdles. Descendants of these Cumbrian farmers are still farming in East Meon today. The breaking up of large estates following the first World War affected East Meon as elsewhere and some of the changes in landownership are traced in the book. As for the impact of the War Agricultural Executive Committee on the village during the second World War, oral evidence is presented of a farmer being shot at Botley in Hampshire whilst resisting confiscation of his land: whether this is a mis-located reporting of the well-known case of Ray Waldon of Itchen Abbas, also in Hampshire, or to a previously undocumented event is not clear.

The final chapter looks at farming in the valley since the 1950s and reviews the continuing agricultural activity in East Meon: the farms are larger, there is more specialization in both livestock kept and crops grown, yet there is some continuity in the farming families of the village. In the conclusion, the editor notes that, on the whole, East Meon has avoided public attention, apart from the Parliamentary army camping there in 1644 and the incident over the tithing of turnips and, therefore, its history is little different to that of many other English rural villages.

The book includes over 50 specially commissioned maps and plans, with the support of the Heritage Lottery Fund: these along with a large number of captioned, colour photographs provide ample illustration for the accompanying text. However, the book would have benefited from a thorough proof-reading: the text is littered with minor errors and typographical mistakes, for example, ‘Buster’ rather than ‘Butser’ (of ancient farm reconstruction fame) in the caption on page 24 and in the table on page 83, where it states that the 1851 Census records that William Weeks junior of Oxenbourne Farm employed 489 boys, this figure actually being the arable acreage. Further, there are two occasions where the conclusion to a chapter actually presents a summary of the next chapter. Despite these shortcomings, this is a well-illustrated micro-history of agricultural practices in a single village.