Farm servants in North Wiltshire: the evidence of hiring fairs, 1837–1860

Kolosov, Mikhail (2024) Farm servants in North Wiltshire: the evidence of hiring fairs, 1837–1860. Agriculture History Review. ISSN 0002-1490 (In Press)

Text (KolosovArticleNov24) - Published Version Pending embargo until 1 January 2100. Download (1MB)

Abstract

Our understanding of several important aspects of farm service in the nineteenth century remains limited. What share of servants lived in? How important were payments in kind? How well did servants fulfil their contractual obligations? To answer these and related questions this article explores a large body of new evidence specifically dedicated to farm servants: registers from two north Wiltshire hiring fairs, documenting 11,000 hiring agreements from 1837 to 1860. The fairs were introduced to facilitate the hiring of dairymaids, and declined when the collapse of cheese-making made them vulnerable to the fair abolition campaign. Farmers hired almost all their servants at their major local fair, while servants used it for less than a third of their job moves. The article shows how a creative use of a traditional institution supported progressive agriculture; adaptation to its needs required flexibility in terms of employment, but the incidence of non-residential service was limited numerically and selective by gender.

Item Type:	Article
Additional Information:	© 2024
Divisions:	Economic History
Subjects:	S Agriculture H Social Sciences > HC Economic History and Conditions
JEL classification:	Q - Agricultural and Natural Resource Economics; Environmental and Ecological Economics > Q1 - Agriculture > Q12 - Micro Analysis of Farm Firms, Farm Households, and Farm Input Markets
Date Deposited:	18 Nov 2024 10:12
Last Modified:	17 Dec 2024 16:48
URI:	http://eprints.lse.ac.uk/id/eprint/126087

Actions (login required)

View Item