SOCIAL AND ECONOMIC HISTORY 



Common (350 acres), Hillingdon Heath (160 acres), Ruislip Common 

 (1,500 acres), Sunbury (1,400 acres), Memsey Moor, Goulds Green, Peil 

 Heath, Hanwell Common, Wormwood Shrubs in the parish of Fulham, 

 and between 400 and 500 acres of waste in Hendon. 



The good intentions of Henry VIII evidently bore but little fruit, for 

 Hounslow Heath was far the largest waste, still containing in 1754 over 

 6,000 acres. According to the reports the common rights were profit- 

 able only to a few wealthy farmers, borderers on the heath, who over- 

 charged the pasture with immense numbers of ' grey-hound-like sheep ' ; 

 and to a few cottagers who cut turf and fuel for sale. In 1789 Stan well 

 inclosed its share of the heath, and 300 acres of practically valueless land 

 was by 1793 worth from I5J. to 2$s. the acre. 



There still remained of Enfield Chase some 3,000 to 4,000 acres 

 uninclosed of ' good soil and improvable,' thanks mainly to the tenacity 

 with which the Enfield tenants, like their Elizabethan predecessors, clung 

 to their common rights, which their unstinted exploitation had reduced 

 to little more than scanty and very unhealthy pasture for a few half-starved 

 cattle. They badly needed small inclosed fields, but the Enfield commoners 

 may, not unwisely, have reflected that inclosure was by no means certain 

 to bring the desired inclosed fields into their hands. A considerable 

 portion of the chase was inclosed by Act of Parliament in 1777, as 

 the reporter allows, not profitably ; a failure which he attributes to bad 

 management. Better success attended an inclosure made by the parish of 

 South Mimms (nearly 1,000 acres) which raised the annual yield of the 

 land from 2s. to 15^. the acre. 153 Practically the whole chase, 3,540 

 acres, was inclosed in 1801 (see table). 



Finchley Common, which in 1754 contained 1,243 uninclosed acres, 

 was reported to be good soil for cultivation, though part of it was excellent 

 road gravel. 900 acres were inclosed here in 1811 (see table). The 

 annexed table of inclosures in Middlesex 164 has been put together from a 

 list of Inclosure Acts 1702-1876 in Clifford's Private Bill Legislation 

 and a list of Middlesex inclosures in the Middlesex and Hertford Notes 

 and Queries, supplemented from the tables in Dr. Slater's The English 

 Peasantry and the Inclosure of Common Fields. 1 The table shows that a 

 great deal of land was inclosed in Middlesex during the latter years of 

 George Ill's reign. As the increased inclosures so near London began 

 to assume a less admirable complexion, the necessity of maintaining open 

 spaces round the City which had been so clear to Elizabeth's ministers 

 once more impressed a less far-seeing public opinion, and an Inclosure 

 Act of 1854 prohibited the inclosure of common fields within ten miles 

 of London. The general Inclosure Act of 1845 required the special 

 consent of Parliament for inclosures of wastes within fifteen miles of 

 the capital. And the later history of Middlesex inclosures is that of 

 the struggle for open spaces led by the Commons Preservation Society. 



Iu Rep. to Bd. of Agrtc. (1794). ** A PP- IIJ - "* P- cit - ' A PP- B - 495 se q- 



"* Op. cit. i, 55. Between 170* and 1796 five private inclosure Acts were passed for Middlesex, 

 inclosing among them 7,875 acres. Dr. Slater states the area inclosed by these five Acts at 1 1,854 seres. 



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