Description
Book SynopsisThe first systematic analysis of the early nineteenth-century allotment movement. The living standards of the rural poor suffered a severe decline in the first half of the nineteenth century as a result of high population growth, changing agricultural practices, enclosure and the decline of rural industries. Allotment provision was the most important counterweight to the pressures. This book offers the first systematic analysis of the early nineteenth-century allotment movement, providing new data on its chronology and on the number, geographical distribution, size, rents, cultivation yields and effect on living standards of allotments. It thus shows how the movement brought the culture of the rural labouring poor more closely into line with the mainstream values of respectable mid-Victorian England, and casts new light on central aspects of early and mid-nineteenth-century social and economic history, agriculture and rural society. JEREMY BURCHARDT is lecturer in Rural History,University of Reading.
Trade ReviewA full and important study of allotments which addresses wider rural social issues and relationships. * HISTORY *
[The book] is about more than the early allotment movement: it is a book about changing rural,social and class consciousness, [and] about the creation of a social consensus and about domestic and cultural life. * GARDEN HISTORY *
An excellent study of the heretofore-almost-ignored allotment movement.. The value of [this] book, for having opened to scrutiny this little-studied facet of 19th century life, is incontrovertible. * ALBION *
[Makes] a compelling case for locating allotments at the heart of the narrative of mid-nineteenth century social progress and stability. * AGRICULTURAL HISTORY REVIEW *
Breaks new ground as the first substantial scholarly account of allotments in c19th England. [.] Rescue[s] allotments from their positions at the margins of historical inquiry. Burchardt's book makes a compelling case that allotments deserve more attention than they have hitherto received, and sets a high standard for the research that will surely follow. * LANDSCAPE HISTORY *
