Almost the first time I went to Evesham, in passing Chipping Norton
Junction--now Kingham--three or four men on the platform, in charge of
the police, attracted my attention. I was told that they were rioters,
guilty of a breach of the peace in connection with the National
Agricultural Labourers' Union, then under the leadership of Joseph
Arch. Being so close to my new neighbourhood, where I was just
beginning farming, the incident was somewhat of a shock. Arch
undoubtedly was the chief instrument in raising the agricultural
labourer's wages to the extent of two or three shillings a week, and
the increase was justified, as every necessity was dear at the time,
owing to the great activity of trade towards the end of the sixties.
The farmers resisted the rise only because, already in the early
seventies, the flood of American competition in corn-growing was
reducing values of our own produce; and as all manufactured goods
which the farmer required had largely increased in price, he did not
see his way to incur a higher labour bill.
Arch sent a messenger to me a few years later, to ask permission to
hold a meeting in Aldington in one of my meadows. I saw at once that
opposition would only stimulate antagonism, and consented. The meeting
was held, but only a few labourers attended, and no farmers, and
agitation, so far as we were concerned, died down.
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