HAM COMMON. 
87 
HAM COMMON: A STRUGGLE FOR PUBLIC 
RIGHTS.* 
^OT a few of those Avho read these pages have wandered 
among the beautiful glades of Richmond Park, and 
some of them live in its vicinity, yet among that num- 
ber how many have any idea of its origin, or why its 
lawns and noble groves of oak were not effaced long ago to make 
room for terraces and villas ? Some, too, are perhaps unaware 
of the reason for the fierce contest between the villagers of Ham 
and the trustees of the lords of the manor, over the public rights 
of the former on Ham Common and the Common Fields that 
lie between Richmond Park and the Thames. 
All this has been explained and clearly laid before us by 
Mr. W. H. Harland, of Kingston-on-Thames. It is hard 
enough to witness encroachments of the lords of the manors in 
country districts, but the gravity of the case is doubled when 
these acts of repression take place in the neighbourhood of a 
large town, where, if the lord of the manor claims the right to 
enclose, he will probably deal with the enclosure in the way 
most profitable to himself, not by laying it out in cultivation, 
but by disposing of it to the highest bidder for building purposes. 
We have had, however, occasion to drive this lesson home so 
often to our readers that practical application to the case in 
point constitutes the only excuse for bringing it forward. 
If the origin of the New Forest is now shrouded in the mist 
of antiquity, that of Richmond Park (which is a New Forest in 
miniature) stands out clear and sharp. In the year 1635 a deed 
was. drawn up between Charles I. and certain of his subjects, 
freeholders and copyholders of the parishes of Ham and Peter- 
sham. Shortly stated, the deed (of which a reprint in full is 
given at the end of Mr. Harland’s pamphlet) provides that in 
return for the freeholders and copyholders giving up to the 
King 483 acres in the parish of Ham, and 265 acres in the 
parish of Petersham, they should have reserved to them all 
their right and interest of common in all waste grounds be- 
longing to the several manors of Ham and Petersham that 
were not to be enclosed in His Majesty’s new park. Thus 
Richmond Park is exactly two hundred and sixty years old, and 
for the same period the villagers of Ham and Petersham have 
enjoyed the rights of pasturage on Ham Common throughout 
each year and on the Common Fields bordering the banks of the 
Thames for six months of the year. These rights have been 
doubly fortified, first by the deed, and secondly by the time 
they have existed. 
Down to comparatively recent years these rights were fully 
* Ham Common and the Dysarts : a Brief and an Indictment, by William H. 
Harland, Secretary of the Ham Common Defence Committee, Kingston-on- 
Thames. Eaton Hart Bros., Printers, 8vo, 1894. Price 6d. 
