AGRICULTURE IN WILTSHIRE LM THE FIRST WORLD WAR 



71 



amount of arable land, in particular, would 

 decrease. 10 



When conscription was introduced in January 

 1916 the government did to a certain extent 

 recognise the importance of agriculture. The long 

 list of 'certified occupations' included a number of 

 agricultural trades: farmers solely occupied in the 

 superintendence over or personal labour on their 

 holdings, bailiffs and foremen, stockmen, carters, 

 ploughmen, shepherds, thatchers and market 

 gardeners. But in some of these categories 

 exemption was not given to single men under 25 or 

 30. This did not entirely preclude the technically 

 exempt men from being called up but the Recruiting 

 Officer would need to prove to the local Military 

 Tribunal that a particular farm had more men than 

 absolutely necessary. In February 1 9 1 7, in order to 

 achieve some degree of consistency in interpretation 

 of what was necessary, the government issued a 

 scale of agricultural manpower. One skilled able- 

 bodied man was deemed necessary for the 

 following: 



— each team of horses required to cultivate the land 



— every 20 cows in milk when the assistance of 



women or boys was available 



— every 50 head of cattle of stall or yard stock when 



auxiliary feeding is resorted to and the assistance 

 of women or boys is available 



— every 200 sheep exclusive of lambs grazed on 



enclosed land 



— every 800 sheep running on mountain or hill 



pasturage." 



The Wiltshire tribunals also considered evidence 

 on the number of cows it was reasonable to expect 

 a man to milk. Mr. Giles ofWhistley Farm, Potterne 

 told the tribunal that for one man to milk 1 5 cows 

 was out of the question, 1 2 would be the outside 

 number and ten would be quite enough. The figure 

 of 1 2 per man seems to have become accepted as a 

 local yardstick. 12 



Despite this degree of protection, the military 

 authorities did attempt to call up agricultural 

 workers and their employers frequently appealed 

 to the tribunals. In general the tribunals seem to 

 have recognised the importance of local agriculture 

 and were sympathetic to the farming appeals. In 

 the Calne Rural District Council area, where 

 detailed statistics are available, 317 men, almost all 

 from agricultural occupations, applied for 

 exemption. Because of many temporary exemptions 

 followed by further appeals, they appeared in 683 

 cases. The tribunal gave permanent exemption on 



152 occasions and temporary exemption on 404 

 others. 13 



A contentious and sometimes acrimonious issue 

 was the position of farmers' sons. A series of letters 

 in the local press accused farmers of making special 

 arrangements to protect their sons. This accusation 

 was even reported in The Times in June 1918: 



From the neighbouring county of Wiltshire . . . many 

 farmers have been allowed to retain an unfair 

 proportion of their sons, and responsible men, even 

 among the farming class, comment on the number 

 of young farmers who apparently fail to take a serious 

 view of the claims of the country. 14 



It is difficult to decide whether this was justified. 

 There are many examples, similar to the Bridgeman 

 case quoted above, of at least one of the sons joining 

 up leaving another to help run the farm. But there 

 are other examples of farmers taking deliberate 

 action to secure exemption. A common way of 

 doing this was for a farmer to lease another farm or 

 separate part of his own farm and put his son or 

 sons in charge of it. They could then claim 

 exemption as occupiers of land. The most notorious 

 case of this concerned the Godwin family of 

 Crudwell who managed to get five of their six sons 

 'starred' as being in reserved occupations. The local 

 tribunal which certainly had strong agricultural 

 representation within its membership gave them 

 short shrift: "We are going to unstar all the men. 

 We do so because we think it really a scandal that a 

 Wiltshire farmer should have six sons doing nothing 

 for the Army and we think it our duty to this country 

 that this should be done." 15 At another tribunal a 

 farm worker, Alfred Fishlock, applied for exemption 

 but surprisingly received no support from his 

 employer, Mr. Notton of Grafton. Fishlock 

 commented: "I suppose he is looking after his own 

 son instead of looking after me."" 3 



Farmers attempted to compensate for the lack 

 of male workers in a number of ways. There was 

 particularly strong pressure from the agricultural 

 organisations to obtain the early release of boys from 

 school. The Local Education Authority allowed 

 children to leave school and go into a job at 12 if 

 they passed the 'labour examination'. They could, 

 alternatively, leave at 1 3 to go to a job in agriculture 

 without passing the examination. Farmers 

 demanded that all boys should be allowed to leave 

 as of right at 12 (or even at 11) without any 

 constraints. This was strongly supported by Mr. 

 Peto, one of the county's M.P.s, and the local press, 

 especially the Wiltshire Times, which always 



