934 Eevival of Sissex Table Poultry Indi'stry. [Jan., 



THE REVIVAL OF THE SUSSEX TABLE 

 POULTRY INDUSTRY. 



J. W. Hlrst. 



The Sussex table poultry industry has been centred in and 

 around the two districts of Heathfield and Uckfieid, in the 

 Eastern division of the county, since a period long before the con- 

 struction of the London, Brighton and South Coast Railway, 

 when a service of four-horse wagons regularly carried, the fattened 

 fowls to the London market three times a w^eek. During 

 its long history this localised branch of poultry production deve- 

 loped along with it other various minor industries, notably a 

 speciahsed form of milling oats and the making of appliances 

 peculiar to the exercise of the craft. 



In the result, in pre-war days the districts that had in course 

 of time come to depend mainly upon Heathfield and Uckfield 

 stations as the chief centres of departure for the despatch of 

 finished produce owed a good proportion of their prosperity to 

 the flourishing condition of this industry. In a very considerable 

 number of cases whole families found in this work their sole 

 means of earning a livelihood, while a much larger number were 

 enabled to add very materially to an income derived from other 

 sources. 



Apart from those engaged in fattening, as a distinct and sepa- 

 rate occupation yielding a very satisfactory income of itself, 

 others of those who benefited included a large class of farmers, 

 small holders and cottagers who reared the birds for fattening; 

 the higglers and collectors, employed by the fatteners or working 

 independently; the skilled assistants engaged by the bigger 

 fatteners ; and the many cottage women who were enabled to 

 earn from 10s. a week upwards by plucking and stubbing the 

 dead birds on marketing days. Further, in the principal com- 

 plementary industries many more were regularly employed in the 

 manufacture of the back and other collecting crates, fattening 

 coops, and marketing " pads." as well as in making the machines 

 used in the cramming of the birds. 



The development of the distinctive milling process has resulted 

 in the building up of a big industry for the supply of Sussex 

 ground oats, the demand for which has become in recent years 

 very general throughout the whole of Great Britain. Neither 

 must it be forgotten that the present day remarkable, but well 

 deserved, popularitv 'of Sussex fowls among poultry keepers of all 



