Ask the Fellows who Cut the Hay

I've recently read a book I came across titled Ask the Fellows who Cut the Hay by George Ewart Evans. It was first published in 1956 and is based on interviews of farm workers and villagers from the village of Blaxhall in East Suffolk. It contains much detail on day-to-day life. Many of the interviewees were reminiscing about farm and village life in the early part of of the Twentieth Century and therefore the book is a valuable contribution to agricultural history and of rural Suffolk in particular. George Evans wrote a number of books on a similar theme which I hope to also track down.

This book reminded me of the rather more famous and much acclaimed book Akenfield by Ronald Blythe which now has the status of a Penguin Classic and also inspired a film of the same name. This work too was based on interviews of residents in a Suffolk village. 

I felt an urge to re-read Akenfield which I enjoyed doing so very much. There was one passage that made a particular impression and, among other things, added to my fascination of the history of droving and the role of drovers.

Anyone who keeps livestock will be familiar with the challenges of moving animals: from one field to another, or loading them on to a trailer, for example. In my experience pigs are the biggest challenge. Sheep have a strong herding instinct and generally keep together and follow one another. If necessary, when loading a trailer, a bit of cajoling can help. I go through this process every Summer when I take them to a nearby field that a farmer friend lends me for extra grazing. I wouldn't risk driving them along the road!

With adult pigs the only means of success is gentle persuasion, usually with a bucket of feed. You have to allow them to move in their own time and they can easily get spooked. It involves a good deal of preparation to get it right first time. To load them onto a trailerwill take either two minutes or two hours. 

Here's the related extract from Akenfield where a farm labour recalls one of his first jobs aged only 13:-

"The second week that I was at this new farm I had to drive a herd of cattle to Ipswich. I was thirteen and had lived only ten miles away all my life, but I had never been to this big town before. The farmer went ahead in his trap and waited for me at Ipswich market. He sold the cows and bought some more, and told me to drive them back to the farm. Most of my work was like this, walking cattle along the roads backwards and forwards to the market - twenty-five miles a day."

And all for 4s. 6d. per week.