In the case of markets, maintaining confidence in the market was key. The nineteenth century saw an increase in control of livestock markets in towns and cities whereas in the past the auctioneer and his customers were the key to self-regulation. In England regulation and improvement of livestock markets tended to be led by actions and innovations in Smithfield, London.
The Markets and Fairs Weighing of Cattle Acts of 1887 and 1891 required all market authorities to “provide and maintain sufficient and proper buildings or places for weighing cattle.” Under the 1887 Act, which took effect in January 1888, the charges made to weigh the cattle were regulated at 2d. for every head of cattle other than sheep or swine; and for sheep and swine every five or less numbers 1d. This weighing of cattle caused much complaint and was not without opposition. Farmers complained that the weighing of livestock at the market was cumbersome, time consuming and not without some small danger to the animal and handlers. Butchers complained that they were more concerned with dead weight when they bid for an animal and their experience and eye was a far better judge than the scales! The use of scales was summed up with humour: “ The agitation has two objects: the concerned in shewing up the iniquity of butchers in buying, and the gullibility of farmers in selling cattle otherwise than on the basis of live weight.”[i]
The following demonstration, in this case in Stirling, was given at several markets throughout the country: “Last week …..Mr M’Jannet, of Woodland’s, Stirling invited a number of farmers to see his bullocks and weighing machine and about thirty of these accepted. He produced four fat bullocks and asked his friends to value them. Nine farmers did so, with the result that £74 0s.6d. was the result. He then put them on the machine, and announced that they were wrong, that they weighed 45cwt 21lb, and at 36s. per cwt., were worth £81. 6s. 9d. or £7 6s.3d. more than the guessed value. These four bullocks were then sent to Edinburgh market where they were sold by live weight, the price realized being £81. 7s. 6d. A few pertinent facts as these will make farmers everywhere insist on selling by scale value.” [ii]
It has to be noted that after the editor of the Spalding Guardian quoted the above Times article in his paper the objections to livestock weighing faded away. To aid butchers and farmers alike the Smithfield Show Club in London, of which Mr. M’Jannet was a leading member and assisted with, developed tables and guidance for calculating dead weight from live weight. For example:
“For prime butchers’ bullocks found in ordinary markets, multiply the live-weight by 3 and divide by 5.”
“For old fat cows, just take half the live weight.”[iii]
The butchers of Spalding in 1889 were proud of their trade and shortly after the annual Christmas Fat Stock market would be held the annual Butcher’s Christmas Show. The Show of December 17th was a fine affair and a great showcase for quality meat of local provenance.
“Amongst the butchers whose shows of meat were most noteworthy, Mr. Benner was one of the most prominent. His spacious shop in Hall Place was completely filled with probably the largest exhibition of meat, and when it is remembered that the breeders were mainly the brothers H.M. and E.B. Proctor, the quality will not be doubted. The show included four grand oxen at £30 a head; one maiden heifer, two splendid beast, which took second honours at Bourn Fat Stock Show; another grand maiden heifer – a speciality for weight – three well-fed half-bred sheep and five long wools of excellent quality , fed by Councillor Proctor; whilst E.B/ Proctor’s (Gosberton) contributions of two £26 oxen were equally attractive. Mr. Benner’s decorations were also neat and cleanly, and helped show off to the best advantage his splendid collection.” [iv]
The article then continues to describe other butchers, the meat and the farmers names that reared them which turns out to be a veritable “Who’s who” of farmers and graziers from Bourne, through Spalding to the marshes of Holbeach several of the family names I can identify as farming to this day.
As can be seen from the above picture the standards of health and hygiene cannot be compared to today. However, it has to be said, from my experience seeing food processed and manufactured it is possibly that we cannot see the sins of food production as openly. I once visited a farmer that produced very fine pork pies from their own pigs and won awards at the County show the pies were prepared and hand raised on surfaces that were happily occupied by their two farm cats! When one of my relations worked for a large manufacturer of baked meat products it had to be closed down for a deep clean following a night shift worker being found to “make love” to a giant industrial block of lard!
Willcox the butcher pictured above was a long established butcher and shopkeeper with a shop and bake house in Commercial Road, Spalding which is where he was first established in 1868. There they produced highly regarded pork pies. They also had a butcher’s shop at the Black Bull in New Road, Spalding where they would have to contend with the cattle and horse market being held at least once a week. In 1897 they moved around the corner to Hall Place to a larger shop that is still occupied by a butcher today.
However, in 1889 there were significantly lower standards in the storage and sale of food and the town Commissioners sought to improve them with the full weight of the law by making a clear example of poor quality butchers selling unsafe and unfit meat. In December 1889 Johnson Rose, a butcher of Spalding, was prosecuted for selling unfit meat and, being unable to pay the £10 fine was sentenced to six weeks gaol with hard labour at Lincoln prison. The description of the meat he was trying to sell is quite stomach-churning: “It was of a very bad colour the greater portion of it being of a bluish grey. It was moist – it was not set. It was very soft and it gave off a very foul odour. It was beef.”[v]
The defendant did himself no favours by admitting that he had sold about 60lbs of meat off the same animal and eaten some himself. He then produced some of the meat to show the magistrate how good it was, but the smell was so overpowering that he was ordered to take it out of the room!
Spalding’s commissioners were mostly business people with vested interests. They recognised that the town was not just supplying the local population, but was providing a growing market place beyond Spalding that could not have its reputation tainted by poor quality, practises or disease. By the 1890’s it still had some port traffic, but was also a bridgehead for the flower industry, horticulture and farming, mostly by rail but also by carriers cart and boat depending upon the goods.
The marketing and supply of all food was changing dramatically with meat being significant in that evolution. In 1852 Spalding had at least 20 butchers, two of them pork butchers dedicated to pig meat. The pork butcher is now something of a rarity, with the last two in the town being Scuphams in the Market Place, Spalding and Pilkingtons near the Lincoln Arms in Bridge Street, Spalding, both sadly no more. Each butcher had its own recipes that were unique to them and were closely guarded secrets. The family butchers that remain in Lincolnshire to this day uphold this tradition that is part of our heritage with the most notable in Spalding being Bennetts Butchers in Winsover Road, Spalding who not only preserve their own long-standing recipes but also those of Brownings a butcher from Deeping St Nicholas that had a very distinctive and old recipe that was well known and liked throughout the County and beyond.
Most butchers of that time slaughtered their own meat either at their premises, or a nearby slaughterhouse, or, in the case of pigs, often on the farm taking away the carcass. Smallholders, and even some town dwellers would have pigs as an extra source of meat and income. You can still find older properties in the area with outbuildings that were the pig stys, some used up to the early 1970’s.
Livestock of all kinds were supplied into the market by a mixture of farmers and smallholders. Lower-yielding short horn varieties bred for meat and milk were common place and dominant in many market town markets as they enabled a living on smaller areas of land with little need for supplementary feeding. Farming was largely lower inputs and lower yield, but a living was to be had.
[i] The Guardian January 19th 1889
[ii] Article from The Times quoted in the Spalding Guardian 1889
[iii] Stephen’s Book of the Farm 5th edition 1908
[iv] Lincolnshire Boston and Spalding Free Press 24th December 1889
[v] Lincolnshire Boston and Spalding Free Press 24th December 1889
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