Enclosure - & Dartmoor's last legal squat

[Tony Gosling]

Duchy of Cornwall
That's Prince Charles to you and I
some things don't change eh?

But this will have to!
T

Full text of "A hundred years on Dartmoor; 
historical notices on the forest and its purlieus 
during the nineteenth century"
http://www.archive.org/stream/hundredyearsonda00cros/hundredyearsonda00cros_djvu.txt
http://www.repressedpublishing.com/a-hundred-years-on-dartmoor-historical-notices-on-the-forest-and-its-purlieus-during-the-nineteenth-century.html

In addition to those already named as having 
taken in hand the reclamation of a part of
Dartmoor, enclosures were also made a little 
later, with the same aim, by Messrs. Thomas and John
Hullett, the Rev. Mr. Vollans, who purchased 
their land on the death of the former, the Rev. J. H.
Mason, for many years vicar of the Moorland 
parish of Widecombe, and Mr. Thomas Sanders. To
these others have succeeded in more recent years, 
and although not proving particularly profitable
undertakings the practice of enclosing might, 
from a desire on the part of some to acquire exten-
sive tracts of land at a low price, have 
continued to the present time had not the attention of the
Duchy been called to the serious encroachments 
that were being made on the rights of the com-
moners.

The practice of "squatting" on the Moor had not 
been stopped at the beginning of the
19th century. The belief that formerly obtained 
in regard to it was that if a house could be erected
and a piece of land enclosed in a single day 
between sunrise and sunset, the builder could claim
such as his own. The last instance of such a 
proceeding occurred about 1835, when a small
house now known as Jolly Lane Cot, was built by 
the side of the road leading to Hexworthy
Bridge, on the West Dart. Everything being in 
readiness, the labourers of the neighbourhood
met on the site, on a day when the farmers, who, 
as holders of the ancient tenements, had rights
on the Forest, and would, it was feared, have 
prevented their plans, had departed to attend
Ashburton Fair. Work was commenced, all 
cheerfully lending assistance. Even before the
walls at one end of the house were up, the laying 
on of the thatch of the roof had begun at the
other. By evening all was done, and the 
"squatters" were in possession. But this attempt at
"land cribbing" was only partially successful. It 
is true no ejectment followed, but a small rental
was put upon the place by the Duchy. The cottage 
was inhabited until her death, in March,
1901. by the aged widow of its erector, who built 
it in order to provide a home for his parents.

Emacs!

Jolly Lane Cottage - Hexworthy - Dartmoor (2012)

These houses were, of course, very rudely 
constructed, as, indeed, were all the dwellings
of the Moor farmers a hundred years ago, though such as had been built under
different circumstances were of a more enduring 
type. They were low erections, with
thick walls of granite blocks, roughly squared, 
and roofs of thatch. The doorway, often
arched, gave admittance not only to the farmer 
and his family, but to the cattle
as well, one part of the house being apportioned 
to the former and the other to the latter.
Narrow, spiral, stone staircases sometimes led to 
upper apartments, and in the quarters of the
cattle, stones projecting from the wall, in the 
manner of a hedge stile, formed a means by which
the loft, or tallet, could be reached. Thus the 
cattle could be supplied with the fodder that was
there stored without the necessity of the owner 
leaving the house, a provision evidently intended
as a safeguard against the snowstorms and general 
inclemency of winter. Several old houses of
this kind are still to be seen on and around the 
Moor. The Moor farmer's lot was a hard one,
and yet its Free and independent character 
doubtless rendered him happy in his way. With no
luxuries, he was yet not deficient of many 
comforts ; and though there was little cessation to
his labour, he knew that his work was directly 
for the benefit of his family and himself — that he
was the lord of his own little estate. Raising 
his scanty crops and attending to his cattle
pastured on the Moor, and in summer cutting and 
preparing peat for fuel, were his principal
occupations.

The implements he used were rude and primitive in 
style. His plough was a clumsy-
looking contrivance of wood, yet doing its work 
well, and which he knew as a sull ; while
for threshing he used the flail — drashel in the 
Devon vernacular — for although threshing
machines were coming into use in most parts of 
the county in the early years of the 19th
century, such were utterly unknown on Dartmoor. 
Wheeled conveyances he had none, everything
being carried on the backs of horses on crooks or 
in dung-pote, or drawn by oxen on a slide, or sledge.
The crooks were formed of curved poles, connected 
by bars, and being placed over a pack-saddle,
kept in position the load which was piled on the 
latter. A shorter kind were called crubs, which
were employed when they best suited the nature of 
the burden to be carried. By means of these
appliances, peat and furze, which formed the Moor 
farmer's only fuel and kindling wood, and
dried ferns, which he used as litter for his 
cattle and horses, were conveyed, as well as other
articles of a similar kind. In the dung-pots was 
carried the manure from the farmyard to the
fields.

Oxen were used both for ploughing and for draught 
purposes. It is stated that a team
of ten oxen was required to plough the fields of 
the now deserted farm of Hen Tor, in the Plym
valley, and twelve yoke were employed to 
transport the great flat stone from the despoiled
meeting-place of the stannators on Crockern Tor 
to Dunnabridge Farm, Oxen were also used
to remove from its original position Ouldsbroom 
Cross to Town Farm, nearly two miles distant,
where it was made to serve the purpose of a 
gate-post, and an old man living at the Higher Lodge,
Spitchwick, some thirteen years ago, was able to 
remember the names by which the animals were
knowji. The timber used in the construction of 
Fox Tor Farmhouse, to which there is no
road, was also drawn by oxen, and their 
employment seems to have been as general on the Moor
as in the other parts of Devon. Very primitive 
was the contrivance for the hanging of gates,
by which hinges and posts were altogether 
dispensed with, some examples of which still exist. The
bottom of one of the stanchions of the gate was 
placed in a socket cut in a stone sunk level with
the ground, its upper end fitting loosely into 
another, drilled in a stone projecting from the top
of the wall. Doors of outbuildings were also hung 
in the same way. Another plan for securing
the entrance to a field was the use of bars, 
placed in sockets and slots, cut in posts standing in
the position of gateposts. Panniers were also in 
common use for the conveyance of certain
produce to the markets of the small Moorland 
border towns, and on the pillion rode the farmer's
dame when she journeyed with her good man, 
sharing with him their single horse.

Besides the cattle and sheep pastured on the Moor 
by the holders of the Forest tenements,
there were also large numbers turned upon it by 
the occupiers of certain estates in the parishes
surrounding Dartmoor, who were known as Venville 
tenants, and this is the case at the present
day. In 1793 considerable pains were taken to 
ascertain the number of sheep summered on the
Moor, when it was found there were from 110,000 
to 120,000 so pastured. In 1797 the number
had fallen to about 80,000, the decrease, it was 
considered, being brought about in large
measure by the action of the "improvers" of 
Dartmoor, who in forming their enclosures had
taken from the commoners the best parts of the Forest.

Mining on Dartmoor and on its borders, which for 
some time had not been in a flourishing
condition, began to revive somewhat towards the 
end of the 18th century, but several of the
mines working during the early years of the 19th have since been abandoned.

 From the earliest times Lydford Castle has been 
connected with Dartmoor, and until the
Duchy Courts were removed to Princetown they were 
held there. The Castle is now a ruin,
but less than a hundred years ago it was in 
tolerable repair. The court was held in a large
apartment above-stairs, on three sides of which 
was a railing. It was furnished with a seat,
called the judge's chair, and with others for the 
accommodation of the members. The Lord of
the Forest of Dartmoor, whose courts here 
assembled, was during the closing years of the 18th
and opening years of the 19th centuries George 
Augustus Frederick, Prince of Wales, afterwards
George IV.

At the same time that modern agricultural efforts 
on Dartmoor were in progress, attention of
another kind was being paid to that interesting 
region. In 1802 the Rev. E. A. Bray, son of
the founder of Bair Down, entered upon his 
investigations of the pre-historic remains on the
Moor, a work, however, that had been begun by 
Polwhele several years previously. This has
been continued by others during the century, with 
the result that much light has been let in
upon the subject, and has enabled us to learn 
something of the meaning and uses of these
ancient monuments,

When the 19th century dawned Dartmoor, though 
crossed by a good road, still remained
to most a terra incognita. The rude houses of the 
settlers, with a few exceptions, were the
only habitations upon it, and agricultural 
improvements were in their infancy. Where Prince-
town now stands was then a barren waste, and 
there was little on the Moor to show the change
that was impending. That change has come, and 
although the progress of years can be plainly
marked to-day, yet is the face of the Moor 
altered but in a small degree. The vast tracts of
land to the north and south of the land to which 
attempts at reclamation have been confined are
still as remote, as ever, and have lost nothing of their primeval aspect.
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