Part 9 of Nunney Scarecrows: Child Labour and Education in Nunney, Somerset. #OnePlaceEducation 🗃️ In many rural communities it was down to the personal influence of the local clergyman or squire whether boys generally remained at school one or two years longer than in a neglected parish. 🧵 1/~ - ThreadSky

Part 9 of Nunney Scarecrows: Child Labour and Education in Nunney, Somerset. #OnePlaceEducation 🗃️

In many rural communities it was down to the personal influence of the local clergyman or squire whether boys generally remained at school one or two years longer than in a neglected parish. 🧵 1/~

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madpadre.bsky.social•1 day ago

Great thread - thank you for it. Grateful that as a clergyman today I don’t have to run a school but made me appreciate the work clergy did in 19th century education.

handle.invalid•1 day ago

In 1867 Parliament set up a Commission of Enquiry into children's working conditions in agriculture. The Commissioners interviewed children and adults around the country, including Nunney. According to the report published by Her Majesty's Commissioners two years later: 2/~

handle.invalid•1 day ago

"With the low wages she and her husband receive it is but natural that, as soon as ever a child is capable of frightening a bird, the mother should come to the farmer and ask for work for him. The work is always given, though many a farmer will tell you such a boy is no real good.” 3/~

handle.invalid•1 day ago

“It is customary to employ the son of one of his own labourers. On the other hand, the mother will often say the farmer requires the boy, and they do not like to refuse him. When Lady-day comes the clergyman knows as well as possible that the school will be half deserted.” 4/~

handle.invalid•1 day ago

“It becomes his object to induce as many parents of children as he has sufficient influence over to suffer their children to remain."

Lady Day (Feast of the Annunciation, 25 March) was traditionally when year-long contracts between landowners and tenant farmers would begin and end in England. 5/~

handle.invalid•1 day ago

Farmers' time of "entry" into new farms and onto new fields was often this day. As a result, farming families who were changing farms would travel from the old farm to the new one on Lady Day. 6/~

handle.invalid•1 day ago

Clergymen were often told that they would have to pay the parents compensation for the earnings the child would have brought in as a bird scarer. In addition, there were school fees to be paid. 7/~

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