The Whistler at the Plough

Abstract

Alexander Somerville (1811–85) was an extraordinary figure, notorious in his own lifetime for his espousal of political reform. The youngest child of impoverished farmers from the Scottish border country, he was the last soldier to be flogged publicly in Britain, after openly stating that his regiment would not fire on Reform agitators. In his subsequent journalistic career his stance was influenced by his concern that violent revolution would inevitably be crushed and so lead to greater suffering among the working class, and he therefore supported the less radical reform movement urged by Cobden. He was a passionate opponent of the Corn Laws, and The Whistler at the Plough (published in 1852) is a collection of his letters and essays for the Anti-Corn-Law League, based on information gathered during his own travels around the country. The volume also contains his eyewitness account of the Irish famine of 1847.

Patrician Landscapes and the Picturesque in Nottinghamshire c.1750–c.1850

“…In 1843, the agricultural commentator Alexander Somerville, writing under the pen-name of 'The Whistler at the Plough', criticised 'ornamental cottages and lodges at park gates as destitute of comfort as the hovel on the farm: mere ornament being everything, the comfort of the in-dwellers nothing'. 67 The very act of enclosing and empaling a park meant the abolition of all forms of common and customary rights within its remit and these rights were irrecoverable. Nottinghamshire's elite ducal parks were created before the parliamentary enclosure movement, which affected some 6.8 million acres of land (twenty per cent of the countryside) nationally between 1750 and 1830, resulting in the loss of about two-thirds of all former open fields.…”

“Socialist Turnips”

“…Indeed, Somerville's political advice to those members of the establishment ('noblemen, gentlemen, clergy') opposed to the Owenites is that they start to demonstrate that 'good farming is not necessarily an adjunct of Socialism'. 110 Similarly, Harriet Martineau, having visited Shaker and Harmonist settlements, identified the willingness of everyone in the community, both men and women, to 'labour their share', together with the possible economies of scale in communal agriculture (relative to neighbours farming on the basis of individual families), as key determinants of communitarian wealth. 111 Whether, and to what extent, that universal work ethic and those economies of scale might be achievable in 'the old world' is treated as an open and important question.…”

“…The Owenites criticised the effect of competition on character, but took advantage of the availability of outside wage-labour to do the heavy agricultural work for which their members lacked the skills and stamina. 119 The Shakers also used outside wage-labour to varying extents; Charles Nordhoff, writing in 1875, found individual Shaker villages employing up to seventy-five hired labourers. 120 And Zoar was dependent on 'Babylon' for providing fifty outside workers, who lodged in a dormitory in the community.…”

Free Trade and Print Culture: Political Communication in Early Nineteenth-Century England

“…The League propagandist Alexander Somerville caught the mood of technological optimism when he wrote that 'by railways, penny postage and printing presses, a mighty movement is in progress, which will achieve, be it for good or evil, what no other power or combination of powers ever achieved'. 38 Improvements in communications and technology allowed print to be produced and circulated in ever larger quantities, while the annual compilation of electoral registers stipulated in the 1832 Reform Act made possible the systematic targeting of literature at electors. In 1843 the League distributed over 5 million anti-corn law tracts to electors, with another 426,000 stitched into periodicals and newspapers.…”