West Haddon Enclosure Award

Parliamentary Enclosure was the process by which many parishes, particularly in the Midlands, were converted from the medieval open-field system of farming, to a system of modern ring-fenced farms. 1 August, Lammas Day, was the day on which, by tradition, the cropped land of the parish had been thrown open for the common grazing of all the village livestock, but not in 1765, the year West Haddon’s enclosure was finalised.

The villages of Long Buckby and Guilsborough were also going through the process of Enclosure at this time and discontent was running high in the area amongst tenants and the landless. The rents of tenant farms were doubling and land which had always been open and accessible was now being fenced off. The enclosure award for the parish, closely written on 13 large sheets of parchment, recorded precisely which land had been allocated to each landowner in lieu of their previous landholding. This document represents the process that led to the west Haddon riot.

An advertisement in the Northampton Mercury advertised football matches in West Haddon on 1 and 2 August. For those who could read between the lines, the ad carried an additional message. The following week the same paper reported

"We hear from West-Haddon in this County, that on Thursday and Friday last a great Number of People being assembled there, in order to play a Foot-Ball Match, soon after meeting formed themselves into a tumultuous Mob and pulled up and burnt the Fences designed for the Inclosure of that Field, and did other considerable Damage; many of whom are since taken up for the same by a Party of General Mordaunt’s Dragoons sent from the Town."

Northampton Mercury, 1765.

Number 59 of the objects selected for the A History of Northamptonshire in 100 Objects exhibition 2025.