Counter-Heritage

A Repertoire of Opposition to Enclosure

A Repertoire of Opposition to Enclosure The Northampton Mercury contained an ‘advertisement for a football match’ at the end of July 1765 to take place over two days, August 1st and 2nd: ‘This is to give notice to all Gentlemen, Gamesters and Well-Wishers to the cause now in Hand. That there will be a FOOT-BALL play in the Fields of Haddon … for a Prize of considerable value … All Gentlemen Players are desired to appear in any of the Public Houses in Haddon aforesaid each day between the hours of ten and twelve in the Forenoon, where they will be joyfully received and entertained.’ On Monday 4th August 1765, the Northampton Mercury reported thus: ‘We hear from West Haddon in this County, that on Thursday and Friday last a great Number of People being assembled there in order to play a Foot-Ball Match, soon after meeting formed themselves into a Tumultuous Mob, and pulled up and burnt the Fences designed for the Inclosure of that Field, and did other considerable Damage; many of whom are since taken up by a Party of General Mordaunt’s Dragoons sent from this Town.’   Football matches are just one example Of a whole repertoire of opposition To the supporters of enclosure: Grumbling, counter-petitioning, Refusal to cooperate with surveyors, Tearing down hedges and fences, Writing formal letters of opposition, Leaving threatening letters of opposition, Refusal to sign enclosure bills, Refusal to sign sundry legal documents, Stealing boundary markers, Removing indicators of field boundaries, Writing local landscape poems, Expressing anger in public, Expressing feelings of...
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A People’s History

  A People’s Local History I am hoping to stimulate a collective writing of a People’s History: a textual tapestry of life, work and landscape around Stroud, the Five Valleys and the county in the 18th and 19th centuries. (Once that is complete then we will focus...

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Give Thanks to the Book of Trespass

Give Thanks to the Book of Trespass When you’re walking footloose and fancy-free Along some seemingly ancient footpath, Checking your progress on the OS map, Senses working XTC overtime, (Apophenia! You’re part of it all! Just look at the view!) It’s hard to remember...

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Walking the Wall

Walking the Wall from Walbridge to Brimscombe In the early years of the twentieth century, A jingoistic electoral cry appeared: ‘We want eight and we won’t wait!’ (The eight being dreadnoughts or battleships), Well, we waited at Walbridge for a bit And almost numbered...

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Cirencester

‘For 326 years the public have enjoyed free access to Cirencester Park – one of the largest open green spaces in Gloucestershire. On March 15th, that freedom will end. The Bathurst Estate is introducing a paywall for access, with outsiders charged £4 to go...

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Creative Writing Guide

A GUIDE TO WRITING YOUR OWN If you fancy it, here’s a practical easy guide to creative writing. (If any readers are into the intellectual side of all this slipping through wormholes of time stuff, and fancy some prompts about psychogeography, Radical walking and the...

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