[Diggers350] Leicestershire historian/farmer Oli Fletcher on organics & ownership

Tue Apr 8 13:55:17 BST 2025

A chat with Tony Gosling of The Land is Ours 
campaign about direct action, his views of the 
history of land tenure, landlords and peasants. 
We discuss his relationship with George Monbiot 
and views on the Inheritance tax. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Mkn3EiNQWbE
Emacs!

The History of Organic Farming
Farming Explained https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YIgrS7vZR_I
Emacs!

Episode 21 - The Organic Movement. The rise of 
European Fascism inspired the British aristocracy 
to develop an ultra-conservative revolutionary 
movement intended to restore feudalism and return 
the aristocracy to their former position as the 
ruling class. William Sanderson established a 
racist, misogynistic critique of industrial 
society. Gerard Wallop, Viscount Lymington and 
later 9th Earl Portsmouth put his significant 
wealth behind the idea, giving rise to the 
English Mistery. The Mistery attempted to hijack 
the conservative party and install Lord Lloyd as a dictator.

Upon failure, Lymington founds the English Array 
and Lady Eve Balfours estate becomes the 
Haughley Experiment, to defend their 
blood-and-soil ideology from scientific critique. 
Rolf Gardiner leads Kinship in Husbandry during 
the war, while Jorian Jenks is temporarily 
interned for being a threat to national security.

After the war they found the Soil Association, 
which included Jenks and Gardiner who 
corresponded with Nazi Food and Agriculture 
Minister Richard Walter Darre after.

The effects of this are discussed - the 
Sustainable Farming Incentive, the Land Recovery Schemes etc.

We take a look at the Soil Associations 
selective account of its own history, its focus 
on Lady Eve, and the claims of its supporters 
on BBC Radio 4s Great Lives. Sarah Langford, 
author of Rooted, and Patrick Holden, former 
director of the Association, both speak very 
fondly about Lady Balfour while continuously 
dodging questions about why she wasnt taken 
seriously in her lifetime. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Mkn3EiNQWbE

And we follow Lymington as he abandons his soil 
in favour of new servants in British Kenya.

0:00 - Intro
0:30 - Blood and Soil
2:55 - Fascism?
5:00 - British Fascism?
6:10 - The Context
8:44 - Modern Feudalism
13:15 - The English Mistery
15:05 - Peasants!
17:46 - Continental Friends
19:05 - The Plan
21:39 - The English Array
22:39 - The Soil
26:00 - Anti-science
27:00 - Lady Eve Balfour
29:30 - A Second Chance?
30:20 - The Soil Association
31:08 - A Long Shadow
33:14 - The Soiled Association
34:59 - The Cover-up
39:35 - A Happy Ending

Secondary Sources:
Ur-Fascism by Umberto Eco
Eating Nature in Modern Germany: Food, 
Agriculture and Environment c.1870 to 2000 by Corianna Treitel
Neo-Tories: the Revolt of British Conservatives 
against Democracy and Political Modernity by Bernhard Dietz
Dietz calls them Neo-Tories where I call them 
organicists, because they wanted to return to the 
Toryism of the 18th century and earlier. Dietz 
does not define fascist in his book, but his 
description of Neo-Toryism fits firmly within 
Ecos Ur-Fascism, which is the definition I 
believe best reflects the strange dynamics of 
fascist ideology. Dietz also concludes the 
movement fell into irrelevance upon the outbreak 
of war which overlooks its continuation as 
Kinship in Husbandry and the Soil Association.
Stone, D., The English Mistery, The BUF, and the 
Dilemmas of British Fascism in The Journal of 
Modern History Vol.75, (Chicago, 2003) pp. 336-358.
Moore-Colyer, R. J., Back to Basics: Rolf 
Gardiner, H.J. Massingham and A Kinship in 
Husbandry, in Rural History, Vol.12 Iss.1, pp. 85-108.

Primary Sources:
Stamp, D. L., Soil and Civilisation in Nature Vol.158, (London, 1946) p. 853.
Wrench, G. T., Reconstruction by Way of the Soil (London, 1946).
Wrench, G. T., Restoration of the Peasantries, 
with Especial Reference to that of India (London, 1939).
Lord Lymington, Famine in England, (London, 1938).
Lord Lymington, Soil and Survival, Can the 
Health of the Land Survive Urban Science?, in 
Country Life Vol.88, pp.125 (London, 1940).
Lymington, A Knot of Roots: an autobiography, 1965
Balfour, E. B., The Living Soil: Evidence of the 
Importance to Human Health of Soil Vitality, with 
Special Reference to Post-war Planning (London, 1943)
Jacks, G. V. and Whyte R. O., The Rape of the 
Earth: A World Survey of Soil Erosion (London, 1939).

Websites:
https://www.soilassociation.org/who-w...
https://www.soilassociation.org/take-...
https://www.gov.uk/government/publica...
https://researchbriefings.files.parli...

Media used:
Beethoven's 5th
'A Farmer's boy'
'Make Fruitful the Land'
Planned greatergerman reich By Hayden120 - 
"Utopia: The 'Greater Germanic Reich of the 
German Nation'". Institut für Zeitgeschichte. München - Berlin. 1999
Hare by marwan2023 
-------------- next part --------------
A non-text attachment was scrubbed...
Name: 6182c58c.jpg
Type: application/octet-stream
Size: 300398 bytes
Desc: not available
URL: <https://mailman.gn.apc.org/pipermail/diggers350/attachments/20250408/bed6ef5a/attachment-0002.obj>
-------------- next part --------------
A non-text attachment was scrubbed...
Name: 6182c5ab.jpg
Type: application/octet-stream
Size: 244992 bytes
Desc: not available
URL: <https://mailman.gn.apc.org/pipermail/diggers350/attachments/20250408/bed6ef5a/attachment-0003.obj>