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From: "colleen morrison" <>
Subject: Re: Stove Pipe hats - on farm workers
Date: Tue, 5 Oct 2004 00:11:23 +0100
References: <NFEBKNGJIFOEHGGFJODJIEFFDBAA.eldeworth@ntlworld.com>


The haymakers in the photo looked a bit too tanned and muscle bound to be
gentlemen, so my guess is they really were farm workers who, as you say, are
dressed up for the occasion.

I'm not sure who the famous Quaker who lived at Mark Hall was. Can't have
been one of the Arkwrights, can it? Their fortune was built on the back of
exploiting child labour. One of the Wattlingtons or the Althams?

Or are you thinking of the composer of hymns and poems who lived at Potter
Street, Sarah Flower Adams? She was a Non Conformist, attended the Baptist
Church at Potter Street, though she wasn't a Baptist. Apparently the poet
Robert Browning used to visit her.

Colleen


----- Original Message -----
From: "Lawrence Greenall" <>

> Just a guess but could they have dressed up for the camera? As it was so
> early, it must have been quite a thing to have your photo taken. Or maybe
> some local gentry posed as haymakers - the lord of the manor might have
> thought it odd to have his workers appearing in a very expensive
> photograph!
>
> Maybe a google on stovepipe history might reveal hitherto unknown facts.
>
> And finally a very long shot - a lot of the early mechanical pioneers were
> Quakers or of some other nonconformist persuasion - and we all know that
> Essex was a hotbed of such dangerous thought back then! I'm sure one of
> the
> 'famous names' of this group lived at Mark Hall didn't they Colleen? I
> forget who (someone shoot me quick) :@)
>
> Lawrence
>
>> -----Original Message-----
>> From: colleen morrison [mailto:]
>> Sent: 04 October 2004 20:03
>> To:
>> Subject: Stove Pipe hats - on farm workers
>>
>>
>> I've just been looking at the Essex weather book and it has a
>> gorgeous early photograph of haymakers wearing what appear to be
>> the sort of stove pipe hats that Isambard Kingdom Brunel used to
>> wear. Taken during the record breaking summer of 1858 - when
>> grain was harvested in June because of the heatwave , apparently
>> - this photo is, according to the book, one of the earliest
>> photos taken in or around Colchester. Wonderful photo it is too.
>>
>> Sorry if I've asked this previously and have forgotten the reply
>> (memory like a sieve, I have) but was this form of hat commonly
>> worn by Essex farm labourers at that time - and why this
>> particular style, do you think? Navvies used to wear these too,
>> didn't they? Perhaps it was the 'uniform' of the manual worker.
>> The hats don't appear to be very practical for farm work, or navvying.
>>
>> Colleen
>>
>>
>

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