In May 2019 a meter high statue was unveiled in Hall Place, Spalding commemorating the times when Spalding had a May Hiring Fair where agricultural workers would be signed on for the year by their employers. These were significant events and sometimes a little unruly as described in the South Holland Magazine in 1869 and 1871:
1869:
“THE STATUTES – The statutes for the hiring of agricultural and domestic servants were held at Spalding, on Wednesday April 28th. The day being fine there was a large attendance, but owing to the demand for high wages the hiring was only limited, masters and mistresses being unwilling to pay the enhanced prices for labour. A few years ago it was thought the register offices would entirely supersede statutes, and that these latter customs would eventually be numbered with things of the past. Such, however, does not appear to be the case, for if we may judge from the attendance of opulent agriculturists and their wives, and of servants of all classes, at Spalding statutes on Wednesday, the old custom seems rather to be on the increase than otherwise.”[i]
“SPALDING NEWS – The May-day Statutes for the hiring of servants took place at Spalding, on Monday, the 1st of May, and we are glad to state that, although there was much drinking and some drunkenness, there was a marked improvement on the customs of olden time, when Johnny thought it the correct thing to do, was to get gloriously drunk, and fight out any old quarrel which he happened to have had.
Custom, fashion, or the progress of the age, has decreed that a fighting man is a blackguard, and that a drunken man is a nuisance. The altered state of public opinion is gradually but surely ameliorating the besetting sin of drunkenness; even the agricultural labourer, out for his holiday, begins to see that by getting drunk, he not only makes a fool of himself, but also wastes his hard got earnings; hence it is that beyond the few isolated cases , the great May-day Statute now passes off without those scenes of riot and wholesale intoxication which, twenty years ago, regularly characterised the day. It is much to be regretted that some rational amusement is not provided for the industrious lads and lasses, who assemble in such large numbers on these occasions, instead of being left to the ‘twopenny hop’ at the public house, or the tender mercies of the nut-hawkers, card-sharpers, and other prowling vagabonds, who regularly enter an appearance at the statute fairs.
Can no one organise some real fun and jollity for the rustics, which would attract, and which they could enjoy without regret.”[ii]
The Statute Fairs have their origins in the Statute of Labourer’s Act of 1351 which arose from the decimation of the population by the Black Death. In the period 1348 to 1350 about 30-40% of the population of England died from plague. With plague comes a reduction of labour that risks famine and Edward III sought to stave off this by ensuring a supply of labour to enable the continued cultivation of land for food. He did this in two Acts the Ordinance of Labourers Act 1349 and the Statute of Labourers Act 1351. These laws set about to control the labour market and had an impact on hiring right up to the early 20th Century.
The 1349 ordinance had five significant rulings: everyone under 60 must work; employers must not hire excess workers; wages cannot be above pre-plague levels; food must be priced reasonably with no excess profit; no-one was to give to an able-bodied beggar. This was supplemented with the 1351 act that set up a detailed tariff and system of hiring agricultural labour as illustrated by this extract from the Act:
“Item that carters, ploughmen, drivers of ploughs, shepherds, swineherds, day men, and all other servants shall take the liveries and wages accustomed in the twentieth year or four years before so that in the countryside where the wheat was wont to be given they shall take for the bushel 10 d, or wheat at the will of the giver until it be otherwise ordained. And that they be hired to serve by a whole year, or by other usual terms, and not by the day; and that none pay at haymaking time more than a penny a day; and a mower of meadows for the acre 5 d, or 5 d by the day; and reapers of corn in the first week of August 2d, and the second 3 d and so on until the end of August and less in the country where less was wont to be given, without meat or drink, or other courtesy to be demanded, given, or taken; and that all workmen bring their tools openly in their hands to the merchant towns, and they shall be hired there in a common place and not privately.
Item that none take for the threshing of a quarter of wheat or rye over 2½ d and the quarter of barley, beans, peas and oats 1½ d, if so much were wont to be given. And in the country where it is usual to reap by certain sheaves and to thresh by certain bushels they shall take no more nor in other manner than was wont the said twenty year and before, and that the same servants be sworn two times a year before lords, stewards, bailiffs and constables of every town to observe and perform these ordinances; and that none of them go out of the town where he lives in the winter to serve the summer if he may serve in the same town, taking as before is said. Saving that the people of the counties of Stafford, Lancaster, and Derby, and people of Craven and of the marches of Wales and Scotland, and other places may come in time of August and labour in other counties, and safely return as they were wont to do before this time; and that those who refuse to make such oath, or to not perform as they were sworn to do or have taken upon them shall be put in the stocks by the said lords, stewards, bailiffs and constables of the towns for three days or more or sent to the next gaol, there to remain until they satisfy themselves. And that stocks be made in every town for such occasion, between now and the feast of Pentecost.”[iii]
As well as controlling price of labour and the method of hiring the Act sought, to a degree, to free up the movement of labour, for prior laws had decreed that labourers could only travel with their masters permission, usually in writing with a seal. It is generally accepted that the 1351 did not work as workers in a very English manner, tended to continue to demand higher wages and they tended to receive them as landowners feared losing a crop through lack of labour. As a result there was a period of wealth transfer when labourers were better off until the population restored to pre-plague levels.[iv] In 1369 the English poet John Gower said of the labouring classes. “…they are sluggish, they are scarce, and they are grasping, for very little they do they demand the highest pay.”
Elizabeth I had a similar problem in the 1560’s as the population shrunk again due to the ravages of bubonic plague, inflation and some social disorder. However she took a more localised approach by making local magistrates and constables responsible for setting the agricultural wage levels in their regions and sought to make employment in agriculture a national priority as well as regulating training and taking powers away from Guilds to regulate the wages of tradespersons in the Statute of Artificers 1562.
In 1680 the Magistrates at Spalding and Kirton at the General Quarter Sessions of the Peace read and published the rates of wages for 1680 under the 1563 Act with instruction that “the petty constable of every towne shall take copies of these rates of wages…..and read such rates once every quarter of the year , either in their parish church or some other convenient place upon some Sunday or festival day after morning prayers; that both masters and servants and laborers may take notice of these rates, and none of them may pretend ignorance of the said rates, when they are called into question for breaking them…”
The rates of pay at a daily rate are very detailed for each task and include working conditions, for example:
“First the mower shall have and take by day, with meat and drink, 8d., and without 1s.2d; and for mowing every acre of grass, as the acre hath been usually esteemed, the same being pointed out, and well and orderly mown, shall not have or take above 16d. without meat and drink; and for ground of greater measure and burden not above 2s.
And for Ing grounds of that kind, of the greater measure and burthen, not above 2s. and for the lesser measure and burden 16d.
And for mowing of fodder in the water (hauling boats) shall take with meat and drink by the day 8d, and without 16d.
And for mowing of every acre of peas and beans, 14d. and for every acre of barley 12d and oats 10d.
Every man reper, or shearer of corne or rapes, shall have and take by the day with meat and drink 8d. and without 16d.
Every woman reaper or shearer of corn or rapes, with meat and drink 6d, and without 10d.
Every reper for reaping of an acre of wheate, by reate, and making of the same ready for the cart, shall have and take for every acre well done 3s. 6d.
And for every acre of peas, beans reaping, pulling and making ready for the cart, 3s. and for every acre of rapes 3s.6d.
Every man hay maker shall have and take by the day, with meat and drink, 6d. , and without for the better sort of workmen, 12d, and for the weaker sort, 10d.
Every woman hay maker and boy of 16 years, until he be 21 years old, shall have and take by the day, 4d with meat and drinke and without 8d., and by the greate for every acre of hay making of the lesser measure, 12d., and for the greater measure and burthen, 18d.
Every stack maker, and pitcher of a stack, shall have and take by the day, with meate and drinke 6d and without 14d.
Every weeder of corne and graine shall have and take by the day with meat and drink 2d and without 4d.
Every binder of fodder shall have and take by the day, with meat and drink 4d. , and without 8d. and for binding of every hundred of fodder 6 score to the hundred, by the greate 8d.”[v]
The rates were highly detailed and covered other areas of employment such as weaving, spinning, ship making, brick laying, carting, ditch cutting. By having these rates decided locally they could be tweaked to encourage employment in certain areas by the local magistrates using their local knowledge of what labour was required. Whilst the law remained in place until the nineteenth century the actual local decreeing of employment rates fell into disuse and was fading away by the late 18th century. The forces of supply and demand in each case appear to take over the pricing of labour.
[i] South Holland Magazine May 1869
[ii] South Holland Magazine May 1871
[iii] Statute of Labourers Act 1351
[iv] See Walter Scheidel, “Why the wealthy fear pandemics” New York Times April 2020
[v] The History and Antiquities of Boston by Pishey Thompson 1856 page 763
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