Chapter Two
Hinterland of the Vale:
Landownership and Tenure

The community of the Vale may have been an outlying district throughout most of the eighteenth century, but its remoteness never fully insulated Dissenters from the purview of the Establishment. The boundary settlement typology, however useful a framework for analysis, exaggerates the degree of antagonism implicit in the mutual relations of Dissenting and Anglican churches.^[1] The two communities coexisted and interacted: Dissenters maintained their autonomy, their sense of separateness from the world, while engaging the Establishment and Anglican laity in normal intercourse. Leading Nonconformists desired collaboration, and by obtaining it their churches complemented rather than undermined the preeminence of the Church of England. The present chapter studies the underlying structure of this relationship by focusing on landownership and tenure. Since land was the material basis of the Establishment's power, the concentration of ownership and forms of land tenure characteristic of the region ought to have affected the spread of Nonconformity.

The chapter first analyzes the changing structures of landowner-ship in the three parishes of Nailsworth's hinterland between 1777 and 1841, with reference to a standard model used widely to explain the settlement patterns of rural Nonconformity.^[2] If relations between Dissenters and the Establishment had been characterized by a fundamental antagonism, as the model holds, a high concentration of landownership would have coincided with a low

incidence of Dissent. However, a high concentration of ownership coinciding with a high incidence of Nonconformity implies compatibility.

The chapter carries this analysis forward by focusing on the prevailing forms of land tenure. Tenurial conditions, which reinforced the authority of large landowners, theoretically should have deterred Dissenters from settling in their parishes, and the reverse should have been true in areas where tenurial arrangements favored a dispersion of holdings. In Nailsworth's hinterland, leaseholds were structured in such a way that they succeeded in promoting the latter, while not fully challenging the rights of the landlord, especially if he were lord of the manor. The prevailing form of leaseholding combined for the tenant the customary element of security of tenure with an emphasis on greater freedom to alienate the lease, thereby revealing how far property relations had become individualized and making possible the growth of an entrepreneurial spirit, even among the lower classes.

Shifting patterns of landholding, brought about by changes in the agrarian economy, must also have affected the settlement pattern of Nonconformity. For this reason, the third section of this chapter, on agrarian transformation, studies the progress of enclosures of common arable land and wasteland and the pattern of restricted access to common grazing lands; these changes abetted the formation of an industrial working class and stimulated the evangelical revival among its members. Thus changes in landholding patterns, reflected in the shifting concentrations of landownership, the evolution of forms of land tenure, and land utilization, contributed indirectly to the growth of Nonconformity and offered a broad measure of its compatiblity with the Establishment.

Structures of Landownership

Several historians have used a model of parochial typologies, based on the criterion of landownership, to describe the Establishment's relationship to Dissent. Like the boundary settlement and industrial village typologies, this model associates individualism with Dissent and counterposes each, respectively, to deference and established authority. As we shall see, however, relations between Dissenters and the Establishment usually were more

ambiguous. Still, like the two village typologies, the parochial model provides a convenient framework for analysis; after adjusting for its theoretical deficiencies, a more dynamic, more complex, and less reductionist treatment of the pattern of rural Dissent can be obtained (see table 11).

The model distinguishes four typologies, two of which were associated with a high incidence of Dissent and two with a low incidence. "Open" and "closed" parishes stood at opposite ends of the spectrum. The latter (also called "squires' parishes") were characterized by a high concentration of ownership in which one landlord owned more than half the acreage. In open or "freehold" parishes, ownership was widely distributed among small holders whose properties averaged less than forty acres. Two other categories, located between these extremes, offered slight variations. "Oligarchic" parishes resembled squires' parishes, although their high concentrations of ownership were less centralized. A few principal landowners held more than half the acreage, but none of them predominated individually. "Divided" parishes constituted a greater mixture that more closely approximated freehold parishes; a few large landowners, in this case, found themselves surrounded by a majority of small holders. Dissent ostensibly flourished in divided and freehold parishes where individualism thrived, because of more dispersed landholding, and where social control seemed weaker.

This model is deficient in two important respects. First, it lacks an appropriate time dimension. Typologies established on the basis of a single year's analysis cannot always account for possible changes in the concentration of ownership,^[3] and such changes

ought to have affected the pattern of Dissent. Second, the model defines "landownership" in too broad a sense, failing to distinguish freehold land from leasehold real estates. Failure to consider the significance of land tenure, especially, neglects a crucial assumption of the model, namely, the correlation between Dissent and individualist attitudes toward property.^[4] Such failure also ignores an important mechanism, in the structure of leaseholding, through which the landlord could exercise his authority. A region characterized by a dispersion of landholding was, indeed, likely to have had a higher incidence of Dissent. Contrary to the model's central assumption, however, such a correlation was not necessarily incompatible with strong landlordship. This ambiguity becomes more apparent when the model, adjusted to account for these deficiencies, is applied to the local setting.

Analyses of the concentration of landownership are based on data derived from several tithe surveys and from a land tax return, which cover the years 1777 to 1841 for Avening, Horsley, and Minchinhampton parishes.^[5] This period witnessed the considerable growth of Nonconformity. If the concentration of landownership had been crucial to explaining its proliferation, one would expect a significant fragmentation of holdings to have occurred at the expense of larger owners. Our findings, however, reveal a different general pattern, although the change each parish experienced assumed a distinctive form (see table 12).

Averting was an oligarchic parish in 1784, since seven owners possessed 69 percent of its occupied acreage.^[6] By 1838 a paradoxical development had occurred; a further increase in the concentration of ownership accompanied a greater fragmentation of holdings among marginal owners. The parish's occupied acreage rose 24 percent over the period, shrinking the wasteland, and large owners increased their share 37.5 percent. At the same time, intermediary and small owners lost a significant amount of acreage,^[7] as each fell in number, while the number of marginal owners rose dramatically, almost halving their mean acreage.^[8] The aggrandizement by large owners clearly took place at the expense of intermediary and small owners, while growth in the numbers of marginal owners and occupiers occurred partly in response to the shrinkage of the waste, however more marginalized they became. Avening did not, therefore, conform to the standard model. Be-

tween 1784 and 1838, the parish grew more oligarchic in character while simultaneously experiencing the opposite trend. This anomaly suggests that while the diffusion of landownership among marginal holders may have been related to the growth of Nonconformity, the proliferation of Dissent could also have coincided with the strengthening of the Establishment. The two trends, in fact, were not mutually exclusive.

Horsley's structure of landownership changed more dramatically, although in a similar direction (see table 13).^[9] Horsley could be classified as a divided parish in 1784, with seven owners possessing 50 percent of the occupied acreage, but by 1841 it had become a "squire's" parish. The lord of the manor emerged in 1841 as by far the largest landowner, with an estate comprising 2,050 acres or 57 percent of all occupied acreage. Lands belonging to his sole competitor, Edward Wilbraham, the only proprietor in the "large" category listed in table 13, comprised 281 acres or 7.8 percent of all occupied lands. Medium-small, small, and marginal owners all suffered serious losses in both numbers and acreage.^[10] Medium-size owners were the only ones to increase their holdings significantly, although their numbers declined slightly. Thus, the increase in the concentration of ownership was far greater at Horsley than at Avening, while the dispersion of ownership among medium holders remained more limited than the expansion of Avening's marginal sector. The diminished authority of the resident lord of the manor, despite the large holdings of his estate, may have contributed to the spread of Nonconformity, although the lord's active use of the manor court in 1784 had not sought to deter it.^[11] As in Avening's case, a high concentration of ownership, even when accompanied by a resident manor lord, proved to be compatible with a strong tradition of Dissent.

Nor did Minchinhampton conform to the parochial typologies found in the literature (see table 14). Unlike Avening and Horsley, no significant change occurred in the concentration of ownership between 1777 and 1839. Although the number of large owners decreased by two, collectively they retained control of 57 percent of all occupied acreage. The total amount of occupied acreage actually fell as the parish became more heavily industrialized.^[12] Clothworkers undoubtedly abandoned parcels of arable land as they grew more dependent on industrial work;^[13] and population

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loss, combined with greater use of Minchinhampton Common by large landowners, also contributed to the growth of the wasteland.^[14] Under these conditions most classes of landowners suffered some loss. Intermediary owners experienced a very modest advance, while only small owners registered a significant improvement in total acreage owned. Minchinhampton thus remained oligarchic while experiencing a very limited dispersion of ownership among small proprietors. As at Horsley and Avening, a high concentration of landownership at Minchinhampton remained compatible with the advance of Dissent.

The fact that Dissent progressed precisely in those areas where the Establishment remained strong suggests a more ambivalent relationship between the two religious forces than historians have normally conceded. We can explore this ambivalence further by considering the nature of tenurial arrangements. The forms of land tenure found in the region embodied a contradiction; they contained mechanisms of social control, but they also fostered a countervailing tendency necessary for the growth of individualist attitudes.

Land Tenure

The effect of landownership on the incidence of Dissent manifests itself directly in relations between landlords and tenants. The most important landlord in all three parishes was the lord of the manor. The tenures by which tenants held of the lord were the most ancient, although the rigor with which feudal obligations were exacted had softened over the course of time. Many such obligations had disappeared entirely. Some of the more important ones survived and not merely nominally, however, serving as instruments through which the lord could exercise his authority.^[15] At the same time, such tenures as freehold, leasehold, copyhold, and tenancies-at-will underwent a complicated evolution from the medieval period, which led in the direction of greater property rights for the tenantry. Individualism based itself on a refined sense of property right and in turn became associated with Dissent.

In general, small and intermediary landholders, who were not copyholders or tenants-at-will, held leases for lives determinable on 99 years, while large landholders held simple term leases often

for periods of 500 years or more. The lease for lives determinable on years was a hybrid form of leaseholding, combining elements of lifehold and term leasing.^[16] Lifehold leases were "real interests" in land or freeholds; they provided security of tenure because the indenture recorded the names of heirs.^[17] The household head, in other words, could not alienate the property against their will. Similarly, if he died intestate, his heirs were assured of succession to the estate.^[18] Nevertheless, if held of a lord of the manor, such leases invariably contained customary obligations that modified their freehold status. Although originally superior to copyholds, they descended directly from them; with their accent on security, they represented the most traditional form of leaseholding.^[19] The term lease, in contrast, was a "real chattel" and hence part of the household head's personal estate. He could alienate the property at will, either through sale of the lease or through probate, and was given security of tenure only if the length of the term were considerable.^[20] Term leases held on long tenures were most closely associated with individual property rights and entrepreneurship and can therefore be regarded as the most modern form of lease-holding. The lease for lives-determinable-on-years occupied an intermediary position. The law regarded it as a real chattel, as it would any term lease, while giving "the tenant . . . all the other advantages of a lifehold estate."^[21] This hybrid form of leaseholding synthesized the principles of security and independence associated, respectively, with traditional and modern attitudes toward property and, in this sense, emobodied the most mature conception of the right to own property. However, such leases sometimes contained customary obligations that, as in simple lifehold estates, could restrict a landholder's sense of ownership.

Since manorial lordship persisted quite late in the region, the degree to which individualism spread depended not only on the form of leaseholding but also on the degree of survival of customary obligations as well as on how vigorously they were enforced. By inference, we can use the same standard to determine whether the region proved conducive to the spread of Dissent. It is necessary to consider first the structures of leases held of the lord of the manor and then the extent of nonmanorial leaseholding.

The evidence from Horsley manor indicates that customary obligations survived to a limited extent in leaseholds held of the

lord of the manor. In ten of the forty-four leases dated from 1666 that are listed among the manor court's records, heriot payments were required on the decease of each tenant. The heriot was perhaps one of the keenest reminders of a tenant's inferior status because it permitted his lord to share in the inheritance of his heirs; in the medieval period, the lord was entitled to the best part of his tenant's estate as well. Of the heriots present in the leases held from Horsley manor, seven were commuted to money payments, while in only one case (that of Cornelius Chambers, wool-comber) was the cash levy especially severe. In a lease contracted in 1707, he and the two living individuals listed in the indenture were required to pay a heriot of £3 at the decease of each individual; the remaining heriots were paid in kind. Joseph Hiller of Horsley, broadweaver, agreed to pay heriots consisting of "one couple of good fat capons," while John Smith of Horsley, yeoman, agreed in 1693 that the "best goods . . . on the death of each tenant" would be paid.^[22]

The practice at Horsley manor of including such provisions in leases seems to have waned from 1666, although the document that describes their particulars may not have been comprehensive. Nowhere, for example, does it mention entry fines, required of the heir to a tenancy, that were surely a standard part of such leases.^[23] Nor does it refer to the obligation to pay suit at the manor court, although other manor records make clear that suit of court was still enforced by the levying of fines through 1814.^[24] Nor does it indicate the extent to which copyholds and tenancies-at-will survived within the manor, despite the announcement of the lord's perambulation of 1816 having mentioned them.^[25] The heriot was the only customary obligation that can positively be said to have survived in leases. The absence of any mention of entry fines and suits of court may have been purposeful; these may have applied only to surviving copyholds. Most heriots had been commuted to money payments, a change that must have lessened their impact on the tenants' propensity to defer. At the same time, three-fourths of the leases listed in the document did not contain heriots and were held for ninety-nine years determinable on the lives of three individuals. In this form, manorial leaseholds had come to embrace individualized property relations.

A similar development transpired at the manor of Minchin-

hampton-Avening. Unfortunately, no document strictly comparable to Horsley's record of leases survives for this manor. A recent roll for the period 1744-1746 is extant, however, and gives an indication of the extent of the evolution of tenures.^[26] It is more precise than the listing of Horsley's manorial leases since it provides a clear indication of the number of copyholders. However, it is less precise in not always dearly differentiating leaseholds from tenancies-at-will, which must be inferred; nor are the contents of leases described in full detail when specifically referred to. The rental lists 171 tenants, together with the values of their rents. Twelve, or 4.4 percent, held copyhold tenures. Only three are specifically mentioned as holding a lease, although all were clearly doing so as subtenants. Samuel Smith paid a rent of 1s. 3d. on Sarah Hill's lease; John Pinfold paid a rent of 10s "for Nathaniel's lease"; and Mr. Ridler of Edgeworth held a lease, the rent of 1s. 3d. on which was "to be paid by Mrs. Bliss."

More than three leaseholds undoubtedly existed on the manor. The document probably made specific reference to them because of the recent transfer of each tenancy. Ten others can be identified as subtenants, as well as eighty-three who seem to have acquired their holdings by conveyance from the previous tenant. Since tenants-at-will were not likely to have conveyed their holdings, these eighty-three were presumably leaseholders. For the 163 remaining tenants, the document makes no reference to the condition of their holdings other than to specify the values of their rents. They held directly from the lord of the manor, but there is no way to distinguish leaseholders from tenants-at-will among them. The ninety-six leaseholders cited above must therefore be understood as a conservative estimate, although constituting 35 percent of all listed tenants.

Subtenancies and conveyances were forms of commercial activity that reveal an individualist attitude toward property. Leaseholders turned a profit either by subletting or through conveyance, and subtenants or purchasers of a lease may have sought to build up an estate or merely to establish a claim to property. Such estates may therefore have varied considerably in size.

Among the manor's subtenants, William Ratter was charged a rent of 1s. 3d. "for Bath's land"; William Vick, 5s. "for Driver's"; and Joseph Mayo, 2s. 6d. "for Fowler's land." The

smallest subtenant, judging from the size of his rental, was William Minching "for Avery's" at 6d., while the largest was Samuel Peach "for Driver's land" at £2. 3s. 6d. Samuel Peach must have been a substantial gentleman-clothier; besides his landholdings, he also occupied Brimscomb and Symbry mills at rentals of 1s. 11d. and 8s. 9d., respectively.

The rent roll does not give the occupations of tenants. It is still possible, however, to obtain an idea of their relative status. The mean rental value of subtenants' holdings may be compared to the mean rental value of the holdings of Horsley's lessees, whose occupations appear in appendix A. If Samuel Peach (an obvious exception) were excluded from the analysis, the mean rental values of the two categories would not prove to be significantly different;^[27] these lessees, like those at Horsley manor, were plebeian.

A similar comparison can be made between Horsley's lessees and the eighty-three tenants who seem to have acquired their holdings by conveyance. The latter are distinguished in the rent roll by the phrase "that was" following the name of the original tenant. For example, Jeremiah Aldridge held lands once occupied by the widow Dean and by Joseph Wood. The entry reads as follows: "Jeremiah Aldridge. The widow Dean's that was. 6d."; "Jeremiah Aldridge. Jos. Wood's that was. 1s." Nor does it appear that either the widow Dean or Joseph Wood were deceased tenants whose parcels had been relet by the lord. If reletting had occurred, this fact would have been recorded as follows: "Mr. Blackwell of Chalford for Decd. Webb's that was." Another example, which affirms this conclusion, is that of the case of Mary Avery. In 1744, as the tenant of record, she was charged a rent of 9d. "for a house on Hocker Hill," but a marginal notation, "now Wm. Mundy," indicates that the property must have just been transferred. In 1745 William Mundy appears as the tenant of record, at the same rent, "for a house on Hocker Hill, Mary Avery that was." The document clearly captured the act of transference of the property that, had it involved reletting by the lord, should have resulted in a higher rent. Since it did not, the transfer was probably a conveyance of the lease. These lessees hardly differed in status from the subtenants of the same manor; the holdings of each had virtually the same mean rental value and standard deviation as the other. The status of lessees by conveyance at Minchinhampton-

Avening likewise differed little from that of the lessees of Horsley manor.^[28]

Considering the general practice of the region, these leaseholds were probably term leases determinable on lives. Only one of the leases referred to seems to have contained customary obligations. Samuel Smith, cited above, was required to pay 5s. in addition to his rent "for a heriot on the death of Mary and Sarah Hill" from whom he had sublet the holding. A term of years, however, is not specified, so that at minimum the tenure must have been a lifehold lease. It is likely that the leaseholds referred to were all real chattels, however, for there is one case, involving a transfer of property, that specifically mentions a freehold. In 1746 a Mr. Essex was charged a rent of 2s. "for the freehold, Mrs. Crooms that was." Mrs. Crooms had evidently held a lifehold lease of the manor that she conveyed to Mr. Essex. Since none of the other conveyances refer to a freehold, it is reasonable to conclude that they were term leases; and given the practice in the region, among the lower classes, at least, they were probably determinable on lives as well.

If customary obligations do not appear to have survived well among lessees, they may nevertheless have been understated in the rent roll. This seems to have been the case among copyholders, who, by the very definition of their tenures, were required to pay heriots. Yet of the twelve copyholders cited, only one, John Vick, was mentioned as being liable for "capons etc." in addition to his rent of 9d. This citation suggests, moreover, that he was liable for other customary obligations besides. Other tenants, who held directly of the lord but whose tenures were not distinguished in the rent roll, were sometimes cited for such obligations. Edward Dee was required to pay "2s. for a relief" (entry fine) in addition to his rent of 6d., and William Clark occupied a house in Forest Green that required "2s. 6d. for a heriot at the death of the tenant in possession."

References to heriots and entry fines may have been random. In the absence of firmer evidence, however, it seems more reasonable to conclude that their appearance had been waning. It is, nevertheless, of interest that one of the few examples of a customary obligation surviving should have been on a house at Forest Green in the heart of the Dissenting community of the Vale. This shows

that a locality noted for its autonomy and independence nevertheless remained unemancipated from manorial jurisdiction.

The transactions appearing in the records of both manors seem, in the main, to have involved the lower classes. Yet the example of Samuel Peach at Minchinhampton-Avening shows that the middle and upper classes were not unaffected by leasehold practices. Leasehold practices among them, however, differed considerably and usually involved simple term leases. The terms of such leases, moreover, were often extremely long, in some cases approaching perpetuity. As term leases they were personal, not real estates; however, their duration could render this distinction irrelevant as a practical matter. Eric Kerridge has written that very long term leases were anomalous and that during the reign of Henry VIII, at least, they "were granted only with ulterior motives and were disallowed by the common law on the ground that such leases were never without the suspicion of fraud."^[29] Frederick Pollock has accorded them a more legitimate place under the law but suggests that in some sense they were nonetheless fictitious: "Longer terms, as of 200, 500 or even 1,000 years, are conferred upon trustees as part of the machinery of family settlements, and were for sometime commonly used in mortgages. . . . In these cases there is no rent and no real tenancy."^[30]

This was not the case at Horsley and Minchinhampton-Avening. At Horsley, leases for very long terms can be traced back to the reign of Elizabeth. Table 15 indicates the number, the dates, the term of years, and the median rental of those long-term leases listed in the manor's records.^[31]

A wide spectrum of tenants held 1,000-year leaseholds, and a genuine rental was charged on each property. In three cases the rent varied between £1 and £2 for the largest estates; in four cases it varied between 12s. and 13s. for the intermediary estates; and for smaller estates the mean rental was 2s. 4d.^[32] The manor records list occupations only for the 800-year term lessees. John Wood of Horsley, clothier, held a lease dated from 1729 at a rental of 6d. The property was modest, containing a messuage or tenement, a garden, one acre of arable, three acres of pasture, and two acres of wood. Thomas Barnard of Horsley, yeoman, held another lease at a rental of 1s; it was equally modest, consisting of only one messuage in Horsley village. The holding of such leases persisted well

into the nineteenth century. An advertisement appearing in 1823 for the sale of the lease of three messuages at Horsley noted that "the premises are held for the remainder of a term of 780 years, whereof 683 are unexpired."^[33] Such long-term leases were very common in the region during the nineteenth century, and because they were personal estates, they enhanced the lessee's sense of private ownership. Edward Bliss of Nailsworth, a Baptist deacon and clothier with a personal estate in 1832 of £9,000, directed in his will that a certain bequest of landed property be sold and the proceeds invested in securities. "This bequest," commented the estate duty officer, "proves to be a leasehold estate for the term of 500 years and the value is included in the residuary account."^[34] Bliss had undoubtedly referred to the lease of the property and not to the property itself. However, his will's imprecise language, and the resulting need for clarification by the estate duty office, betrayed a confusion that must have arisen from the very duration of the lease. The testator had obviously come to feel that the property, held for such a long period, was tantamount to a freehold estate. Perhaps for this reason, Henry Stephens, lord of the manor at Horsley, prohibited his heirs (who were not his own issue) from granting leases, while requiring them to reside at the manor house.^[35] Long-term leases could result in the virtual alienation of the property by the lessor and, if practiced on a sufficiently wide scale, could lead to the dissolution of a manor.

Even in the case of long-term lessees, it was, nevertheless, possible for a lord of the manor to require an act of homage. Edmund

Clutterbuck, the gentleman-clothier of Minchinhampton-Avening, held landed property from the lord of the manor for two terms of 300 and 500 years, respectively. Yet in 1814 he was required to "surrender" the assignments to David Ricardo, the new lord, "to attend the inheritance of the Manor of Minchinhampton."^[36] The formality may have served to remind Clutterbuck of the true ownership of his holdings. In actuality, considering the length of the term of his tenure, it could have done little to discourage his sense of property right.

Not all long-term lessees held of the lord of the manor. Further analyses of the tithe surveys (shown in tables 12 to 14) reveal that considerable leasing occurred both by and from other owners. The amount of tenant-occupied acreage remained high among all classes of landowner for all three parishes, despite any variations over time. Direct information concerning the contents of such leases is not available, but the leases undoubtedly followed the pattern established by much of local manorial leasing, already widespread throughout the region. The lower classes would have held leases for lives-determinable-on-years, but shorn of heriots and other customary obligations; and following manorial practice, the term of years would have run for a considerable period.^[37] The middle and upper classes would have tended to hold simple long-term leases even if the property involved were modest. Both forms of leasehold promoted a sense of property right, and their proliferation thus serves as a partial index of individualism.

Evidence for such individualism abounds in probate records. Some of this material has been cited in the first chapter, to illustrate either patterns of dual occupation or social mobility in and around Nailsworth. Further examples can also be invoked to show that individualized property relations, embodied in local forms of land tenure, provided a backdrop against which testators of very humble status often sought profitable investments in either buildings or land.^[38]

William Kemish, a Horsley laborer with a personal estate in 1812 valued under £100, bequeathed to his heirs four tenements or messuages in the occupation of his own tenants, together with two "laggards of land" adjoining his dwelling, which he had evidently purchased from two different sellers. Thomas Lewis, a Horsley clothworker, with a personal estate in 1825 worth nearly

£200, bequeathed two dwellings to his heirs, besides the one he occupied at Nailsworth, and a small shop. Joseph Heskins, another Horsley clothworker, with a personal estate in 1818 worth nearly £200, left his heirs four leasehold messuages, three of which were occupied by his own subtenants. In 1764 Phillip Howell, a Horsley shoemaker, bequeathed two cottages besides his own dwelling and a shop occupied by tenants, as well as pasture ground called "Selwin's field" and a close of pasture called "the Hill," with a "haystall of wood thereto." Similarly, in 1757 Thomas Locker, broadweaver, bequeathed two dwelling houses occupied by tenants, a plot known appropriately as "Locker's Leaze," with accompanying pasture ground, as well as a grove of beechwood, likewise called "Locker's grove."

Similar cases can be found among working-class testators from Minchinhampton and Avening. In 1778 Robert Mason, a Minchinhampton clothworker, with a personal estate valued at nearly £250, bequeathed six freehold cottages occupied by his own tenants, one of which possessed three-quarters of an acre of meadow, and a leasehold cottage for the term of the lease, occupied by a subtentant. In 1803 James Bingell, a Minchinhampton wool scribbler, bequeathed his own dwelling with an adjoining enclosure of land "which I lately bought of Mr. Humphry Collins." In 1827 Thomas Baker, a Minchinhampton clothworker with a personal estate valued at £200, bequeathed to his daughter the right to collect rents from "the house now occupied by George Ockford." In 1823 James Sansum, a Watledge clothworker, with a personal estate worth nearly £200, bequeathed three tenements besides his own, each occupied by a tenant. At Avening, Harris Dee, laborer, with a personal estate valued at £100 in 1797, left his heirs a house occupied by Richard Clifford that he "now rents of me adjoining to mine [sic ]." In 1826 Daniel Sansum, a cloth-worker from Forest Green, with a personal estate of nearly £200, bequeathed three messuages, two of which were occupied by his own tenants.

As at Horsley, Minchinhampton and Avening artisans usually possessed more property than did laborers or clothworkers, often in land as well as buildings. In 1763 William Dowdy, a Minchinhampton tailor, bequeathed in trust freehold and leasehold tenements, with lands, both arable and pasture, and includ-

ing barns, stables, and outhouses, at Bestbury and Box villages. In 1772 Jacob Harrison, a Minchinhampton mason, bequeathed to his heirs "all real and personal estate whatsoever," including two tenant occupied houses and an orchard. In 1779 John Cull, an Avening carpenter and yeoman, left an estate that included two small parcels of land and two tenant occupied messuages; although the value of his personal estate remained unrecorded in his will, its monetary bequests alone amounted to more than £230. In 1774 Thomas Holliday, a Minchinhampton pargeter, bequeathed his heirs "freehold lands to hold forever," two tenant-occupied freehold messuages and two sublet leasehold cottages for the term of the lease.^[39]

Changes in the agrarian economy, operating through the mechanism of enclosures, further articulated the spread of popular individualism and eventually spelled the demise of manorial authority. In the period antecedent to industrial takeoff, enclosures of common arable were spearheaded by small owners and occupiers operating within the framework of customary institutions. Such activities helped to erode these institutions and thereby laid the groundwork for their disappearance in the period of accelerated industrialization. Agrarian enclosure and industrialization were reciprocal processes affecting the social equilibrium of the region and in particular the formation of a proletariat. They provided the backdrop for the growth of evangelicalism and the spread of Dissent and for this reason require closer scrutiny.

Agrarian Transformation

The enclosure movement in English agriculture has occupied a controversial place with respect to the process of class formation in the Industrial Revolution. Marx, followed by a generation of historians, had articulated a catastrophic view: the spate of 3,000 parliamentary enclosures between 1760 and 1815 displaced a mass of small farmers, who were subsequently transformed into industrial proletarians.^[40] Contemporary historiography has largely rejected this connection between agrarian and industrial transformation. Thirsk and Yelling have depicted enclosures as a protracted process extending over centuries and characterized by wide typological and regional variations.^[41] G. E. Mingay has ques-

tioned whether the position of the small farmer seriously eroded during the late eighteenth century, and J. D. Chambers has argued that the growth of agricultural productivity, resulting from enclosures, was sufficient to absorb the surplus rural population that Marx believed had found its way into industry.^[42] The first, more traditional, view holds greater validity in the region under study, although for different reasons than Marx would have entertained. The persistence of the small landholder was, indeed, compatible with the formation of a proletariat, especially in areas where piecemeal enclosure had engineered changes in the agrarian structure. Piecemeal enclosure, the process of consolidation occurring by attrition over a long period,^[43] was brought about largely by common folk, although not with the intention of subverting customary institutions. Their parcels were modest and initially functioned compatibly within the existing customary framework. Nonetheless, the cumulative effect of piecemeal enclosure subverted customary practice. The erosion of common arable land laid the foundation for shrinkage of the wasteland at Averting and for the aggrandizement of lands by the lord of the manor at Horsley, both of which had catastrophic consequences for small holders and landless, encroaching cottagers.

Shrinkage of the waste at Avening, however, had also resulted from the activities of encroachers themselves and accompanied a great increase in their numbers. Superficially, this increase suggests the persistence of small holders, but the great fragmentation of the size of their holdings, coinciding with the industrial revolution pointed to their proletarianization. At Minchinhampton, as we have seen, a fall in arable land under cultivation and an increase in waste coincided with a decline in occupied acreage among small holders, the result of industrialization. At the same time, the manor preserved the grazing lands of Minchinhampton Common, so long as access could be restricted to the wealthier members of the community. In the hinterland of Nailsworth, demise of the common arable land and wastelands was completed by the 1820s and restricted access to Minchinhampton Common inaugurated during the 1830s. Correspondingly, the manor courts, the traditional custodians of customary practice, either ceased to function or became the agencies of private aggrandizement.

Piecemeal enclosure of common arable land accelerated from

the late seventeenth century and culminated, in all three parishes, during the early decades of the nineteenth century. References in manorial records, tithe surveys, deeds, and wills, together with an early survey map for Minchinhampton, make it possible to document the process. Manorial records at Horsley make ample reference to common arable fields and the scattered holdings of their occupants during the sixteenth century. In 1570 Edward Rowbottom held of the lord of the manor "three acres of arable land in Telly field, five acres in Wimbley Barrow field and five acres of arable in Binders field and pasture in the Common Fields for 50 sheep."^[44] John Wilkins held "34 acres . . . in Conigre [field] and Common pasture for 150 sheep," to cite two typical examples from the seventeen long-term leases recorded in this period. Reference to a "close" can be found in only three of the lease abstracts; with the exception of one lease, such holdings were in a considerable minority. Walter Keynes possessed a two-acre tenement and a five-acre tenement called, respectively, Barley close and Short-wood close; he occupied "three acres of pasture in the midst of Lethredge, Kellcombes" and "one close in West field containing four acres." The paucity of closes or "tynings," as they were also called, suggests that piecemeal enclosures were first being initiated at this time. It also illustrates the form of the pattern of attrition: small, virtually inconspicuous enclosures in the midst of common fields and clearly not deemed a threat to customary rules.

In the seventeeth century, references to "closes" and "tynings" increased; occasionally such references offer evocative descriptions of the very act of enclosure. In 1707 Cornelius Chambers, wool-comber, held, among several small closes, "two acres of arable land lying in a field called Nupend field lately taken & inclosed with some other lands into a tyning." In 1732 Chambers occupied "Lutsome Tyning lately taken and inclosed out of a field called Wimbley barrow field." A tyning, evidently, could be a larger unit of enclosure than a mere close; its more frequent appearance in the eighteenth century suggests an acceleration of the process of attrition. Nonetheless, most references to acreage in this period would seem to indicate that traditional scattered holdings remained the norm at Horsley, at least until 1770, when the manorial accounts stop. However, the Courts Baron and Leer of the manor continued to operate as late as 1816. As the fourth chapter will demonstrate,

the steward of the manor maintained annual lists of householders; the jury fined nonattendants who owed suit-of-court, prosecuted encroachers on common wastelands, and regularly inspected leaseholds of the manor to prevent fraud against the lord's interests. And all of these activities were undertaken with the solemn air of feudality that suggests the persistence of strong, traditional lordship. Under these conditions, one can reasonably expect that the rate of piecemeal enclosure did not accelerate appreciably until the collapse of manorial authority following the transfer of lordship to the management of a trustee after 1816.

A similar process of attrition can be documented at Averting and Minchinhampton. Daniel Harvey of Avening, yeoman, had bequeathed in his will a parcel of arable land of about three acres "formerly taken out of a piece of arable."^[45] Thomas Hill of Avening, butcher, and his wife Bridget, in anticipation of the marriage of their son, transferred to two trustees "all those four acres more or less of arable land lying in a newly enclosed tyning formerly taken and inclosed out of one of the common fields of Avening called Northfield."^[46] At Minchinhampton the common fields were also called "North," "South," "East," and "West" fields, although they possessed other more descriptive titles as well. In 1777, Revd. Peach released in fee for £283. 10s. "all those 63 acres of arable lying dispersedly in the common fields of Minchinhampton aforesaid called Longfield and Longstone or Southfield now in the possession of Edward Sheppherd, Esq."^[47] Longfield was also known as Northfield,^[48] although it was referred to as "Upper Field" when Richard Harris of Woodhouse, Minchinhampton, a substantial clothier, conveyed to David Ricardo, the lord of the manor, "all that inclosed piece of arable lying in a common field . . . called Longfield, containing by estimation 35 acres"^[49] (see map 5).

The 1777 tithe survey for Minchinhampton records more than 600 acres under occupation in common fields. These fields persisted as late as 1804, when a valuation survey was undertaken for the parish, although by this date much arable land had been left open to the waste and only zoo acres of common lands remained. Map 5 depicts the southeast section of Minchinhampton in 1804 and shows the location of the surviving scattered strips, as well as the proportion of enclosed pasture to arable land characteristic of

Map 5.
Field map: southeast section of Minchinhampton, ca. 1804. Pasture, arable, and
 common lands. Source: Gloucester Records Office P217a/VE1/1, Survey and 
Valuation of Minchinhampton Parish Lands, ca. 1804.

the parish as a whole.^[50] The arable plots, containing these open field strips, were technically part of the common fields but were beginning to resemble enclosures; the strips were either owner-occupied or held as leaseholds. Table 14 shows the distributions of owner-occupied, tenant leaseholds and common field holdings for Minchinhampton in 1777 and 1839.^[51]

By 1777 small and marginal landholders ceased to hold lands in the common fields, while medium and medium-small holders let the great majority of their lands as enclosed holdings. They continued to do so in 1839 with only marginal changes, despite the fall in the parish's total occupied acreage. The greatest change occurred among large and intermediary landholders. In 1777 they held as much as 26 percent of their lands in common fields, and these constituted nearly 18 percent of the parish's total occupied acreage. By 1839, however, common lands ceased to exist. This shift had clearly marked the final progress of piecemeal enclosure of common arable, although surprisingly large holders had lagged behind their smaller brethren.

Common people, such as broadweavers, glaziers, carpenters, small clothiers, and even woolcombers, had initiated the erosion of customary practices in all three parishes. The persistence of manorial control through the eighteenth century had had a restraining effect on the scope of their activities. The cumulative result of piecemeal enclosure was to weaken that same authority, however, particularly as small closes expanded into larger "tynings." As a result, large and intermediary occupiers, in the post-1815 period, were able to effect more systematic assaults on the remainder of common arable and on the wasteland. The erosion of common arable land and wasteland, moreover, legitimated efforts to restrict access to common grazing areas to the more prosperous elements of the community.

Until the 1840s, members of the lower classes, who occupied some land, exercised the right to graze stock on Minchinhampton

Common. A notice of 1813, which warned against overstocking the Common, had reiterated the customary rule: only residents of the parish occupying land, regardless of the amount of acreage, qualified as Commoners, although none could pasture more beasts than their lands could winter.^[52] These minimal requirements were still being enforced in 1830 when as little as 1.25 to 2.5 acres of land could carry with it "the right to extensive pasturage to Minchinhampton and Rodborough Commons."^[53]

The rules of 1843 regarding the stinting of beasts on the Common had not changed in forty years. According to a new resolution adopted by the Court Leet, however, access to the Common would be restricted to those whose lands were capable of wintering "one cow or two yearlings, or one horse or two asses to every five acres [and] one sheep for every two acres of land occupied in the parish."^[54] The resolution also introduced a small charge of 2d per beast. In 1847 the Court Leer made the qualification even more restrictive: Commoners were now allowed "one beast for every £5 . . . and one sheep for every £2 to which they may be rated for land to the poor."^[55] The Court emphasized that this higher qualification would be based on the ratable value of lands and not the value of their crop yields. It increased the levy per beast to 6d, a rise of zoo percent. The qualifications of 1843 were indeed restrictive, but those of 1847 were considerably harsher. As a result, a noticeable shift in the Common's usage became apparent even within this short interval. The manorial accounts of cattle marked for grazing in 1843 and 1851 permit such a reconstruction. The findings appear in table 16.

A 31 percent fall occurred in the numbers using the Common, although the number of beasts per Commoner rose only slightly from 3.1 to 3.8. Still, a high turnover in personnel had clearly transpired. Only fifteen of the Commoners recorded in 1843 reappeared in the 1851 list, and two of them were among the largest animal owners of that earlier period. Table 16 describes the joint distribution of the different types of animals grazed by each year. Comparison of observed and expected values suggests that large landholders came to dominate the Common.

Despite the fall in the number of Commoners, only the number of bullocks and affers changed significantly, both absolutely and relative to their expected values.^[56] Bullocks increased far beyond

their 1843 level in both number and expected value, while affers declined. The number of horses and yearlings declined moderately, while the number of cows remained generally low. Small occupiers were more likely to have grazed cows, affers, and horses; affers were draught animals, and horses were used mainly for carting. The small number of cows in both years reaffirms that by 1843 many of the marginal small holders had already been excluded from the Common. The significant fall in the number of affers and the moderate fall in horses suggests that by 1851 the more prosperous small holders had followed them. The moderate decline in yearlings and the startling rise in the number of bullocks indicate a shift in concentration on the latter type of animal; this increase suggests greater production for butchery, a commercial activity in which larger landholders took a special interest. By 1851 large landholders clearly had come to monopolize Minchinhampton Common.

Summary and Conclusion

Three great changes in the agrarian sector of the economy of Nailsworth's hinterland had coalesced during the critical interval from 1780 to 1840. Enclosures of common arable land and waste-land, together with restricted access to Minchinhampton Common, contributed in a combined yet auxiliary fashion to the formation of an industrial proletariat. At the same time, the forms of leaseholding characteristic of the region showed how far property relations had become individualized.

Leases-for-lives, determinable on ninety-nine years, were generally held by members of the lower classes including woolcombers, clothworkers, laborers, and weavers. When completely shorn of manorial restrictions, such as entry fines and heriots, such leases effectively combined the customary element of security of tenure with greater freedom for the tenant to alienate the lease. The element of lifehold leasing, which survived from medieval times, assured the family security of tenure, while the element of term leasing permitted the head of household to treat the tenement as part of his personal estate. Since manorial restrictions contained in such leases had declined considerably by 1800 and were completely absent in nonmanorial leases, the property relations articulated

by these forms of leasehold permitted the growth of individualism among members of the lower classes; the evidence of subletting and conveyancing on the manors of Horsley and Minchinhampton, no less than the progress of piecemeal enclosures, affirms the existence of such a pattern of behavior, already alluded to in chapter 1. Further analysis of probate records in this chapter has also revealed the widespread nature of popular individualism. The forms of very long term leasing, prevailing among the gentry and high bourgeoisie, reinforced the conclusion that long-term leases, although part of the personal estate of a testator, amounted virtually to a freehold and thereby facilitated the growth of individualism.

The particular form tenurial relations took in this neighborhood thus served to encourage relatively independent attitudes even among the dependent, and this circumstance proved to be crucial for the growth of Nonconformity. Although large landowners dominated the region, in this respect not conforming to the standard model of a district likely to foster Dissent, local Whig landowners showed sympathy toward Nonconformity, partly on the grounds that it offset the weakness of the established church in the region. Evidence from local manorial courts provides additional evidence that Dissenters in this neighborhood were not alienated from established authority in all its forms.^[57] Still, Nailsworth's Dissenters were not completely subordinated to established authority. On the contrary, individualist attitudes toward property, combined with the scattered nature of parochial settlements, established an underlying structure of independence, fostering the autonomy of religious sentiment, and thereby linking Nonconformity to a spirit of individualism.

Evangelical Nonconformity, however, appealed equally to the poor and outcast, for whom the communal atmosphere of Chapel life softened the destructive psychological effects of social change during the eighteenth to early nineteenth century. The next chapter considers the formation at Nailsworth of the two largest Dissenting communities, the Forest Green Congregationalists and the Shortwood Baptists, their developing relations with the Establishment, and the beginnings of their evolution to a more denominational status.