ECONOMIC HISTORY.
Four of the manors had
considerable demesnes in the late 13th century and
early 14th. In 1291 Gloucester Abbey was assessed
for tax on 3 plough-lands in Rudge and one in
Farley. (fn. 36) Field Court manor in 1309 had a demesne
farm that included 120 a. of arable. (fn. 37) Hardwicke
manor in 1359 had 2 plough-lands of demesne. (fn. 38)
Whereas Rudge and Farley demesnes were leased
probably by the late 14th century, and certainly by
the early 16th, (fn. 39) Field Court and Hardwicke,
having resident lords, retained their demesnes. In
1497 Hardwicke manor's demesnes were reckoned
as 170 a. (fn. 40)
Rudge manor in the mid 13th century contained
2 free tenements, 7 small tenements held at will,
and 9 customary tenements. The customary tenant's
characteristic holding was ¼ yardland, but the
yardland was 64 a., roughly twice the normal size.
The labour-services of the customars were comprehensive, and provided for the cultivation of the
demesne. The value allowed for them (fn. 41) was many
times greater than the abbey's notional income in
1291 from release of works and customs in Rudge. (fn. 42)
The customs of the manor were fairly restrictive; a
tenant's heir was obliged to redeem his land at the
lord's will. (fn. 43) The manumission of a neif of Rudge
manor was recorded in 1526. (fn. 44)
The 13th-century customs of Rudge manor indicate, at least in the western half of the parish, an
extensive use of arable husbandry. In the late 13th
century arable lands in the western half are recorded
as lying in ten different fields, (fn. 45) but at least five of
the fields were also used by Elmore and may have
been in that parish. (fn. 46) Only four fields, Hockley
field, Worthing field, Wickley field, and Up field,
are recorded in Hardwicke later, and the other fields
may have gone out of cultivation. In 1649 in the
four which survived as open arable fields much of
the land, perhaps the greater part, was grass leys or
'laynes'. (fn. 47) Later reference to the open fields has not
been found. The conversion from arable to pasture
is likely to have been made in the 14th or 15th
century, perhaps parallel to a similar conversion in
the eastern half of the parish.
In the eastern half the state of the demesne of
Hardwicke manor in 1359 suggests open-field,
arable husbandry; two-thirds of the 2 plough-lands
of demesne arable was under crops, the remainder
being valued at nothing because it was fallow and
common, and the 10 a. of demesne meadow lay
common after mowing. (fn. 48) By 1497, however, only
40 a. of the demesne remained arable, and much the
greater part was in pasture. (fn. 49) The opinions that the
soil is more suitable for pasture than for tillage, (fn. 50)
and that it is cold, sour, and unproductive of any but
the coarsest herbage, (fn. 51) apply more to the eastern than
the western half, but open-field arable husbandry
continued for a long while in the eastern half. The
early evidence is only that relating to the demesne
and a casual reference to Hardwicke field c. 1280. (fn. 52)
In 1612, however, there were three small open fields
in the east of the parish, and one large one: Broad
field lay along the Bristol road, reaching to Hardwicke church at one end and into Haresfield parish
at the other, Whitstones field lay in the angle
between the Bristol and Little Haresfield roads,
Bareland field lay east of Four Mile Elm, and Silla
field may have been the field towards the centre of
the parish that was later called Emny field, where
traces of ridge and furrow could be seen beside the
canal in 1967. In a ddition there were Haywick field,
abutting Quedgeley, and Elmores field, presumably
to the west, and Hardwicke shared in Pirton and
Longhill fields, which were partly in Colethrop. To
what extent the land in the open fields was arable is
not clear; the ridges averaged ⅓ or ¼ a. but had been
consolidated into parcels of up to 2 a. and more. (fn. 53)
Inclosure of the open fields in the east of the
parish was slow and gradual. Some wrongful
inclosure in the period 1562–91 was alleged, (fn. 54) and in
1666 land was described as lately inclosed. (fn. 55) By
1699 most of Hardwicke manor had been inclosed,
but pieces of land remained open in Emny, Whitstones, Broad, and Bareland fields. (fn. 56) The inclosed
land does not seem necessarily to have become grassland, for c. 1703 the parish was said to be mostly
arable. (fn. 57) Some land remained as uninclosed ridges
in Emny, Whitstones, and Broad fields in 1807, (fn. 58)
but it may have been subject to piecemeal inclosure
said to have taken place about that time. Westfield,
the former Bareland, was the last piece of open
arable to be inclosed. Until c. 1835 the field had
continued to lie open after harvest and fallow in
some years; at those times sheep and cattle, mostly
belonging to cottagers, grazed it, but when D. J.
Niblett became sole owner of the land in the field he
excluded the commoners. (fn. 59)
The number of agricultural occupiers appears to
have decreased gradually since 1608, when 16
yeomen and 13 husbandmen were listed. (fn. 60) In 1699
the Hardwicke manor estate, then comprising more
than a third of the parish, included 11 farms, of
which only two were over 100 a. (fn. 61) The same
estate had only 9 farms in 1775, and all but two very
small ones were over 100 a. (fn. 62) In 1808 in the whole
parish there were c. 18 farms over 30 a., of which 5
were over 150 a. (fn. 63) In 1831 there were 17 agricultural
occupiers who employed labour, and 4 who did
not. (fn. 64) The sale and break-up of the estate presumably affected the size and number of farms, but by
the middle of the century the Hardwicke Court
estate was considerably larger than its predecessor in
the later 18th century. (fn. 65) The number of farms fell
from 20 in the mid 19th century to 16 in the mid
20th century. (fn. 66)
In the late 18th century and in the 19th arable
farming predominated in the western part, pasturage in the east. In 1770 half of Hardwicke farm was
arable (fn. 67) and more than half of Velthouse farm in
1830, (fn. 68) whereas only a fifth of Field Court farm was
arable in 1794. (fn. 69) In 1839 in the parish as a whole
twice as much land was pasture as was arable, (fn. 70)
but at about the same date on two large farms in the
west the proportions were reversed. (fn. 71) The land of
the Hardwicke Court estate was greatly improved by
comprehensive drainage in 1847–50, (fn. 72) but its use
remained primarily for dairy-farming, (fn. 73) as in 1967.
Although the amount of arable in the whole parish
had shrunk to 153 a. in 1901 (fn. 74) and was even smaller
in 1933, (fn. 75) the western part was largely ploughed
once more in 1967.
The only evidence of a mill in the parish is the
name of Mill field, ¼ mile west of the church, where
there is a small stream. Little evidence has been
found of trade and industry in Hardwicke before the
19th century. The spicer who witnessed a Hardwicke
deed c. 1270 (fn. 76) may have been from Gloucester, and
indeed the closeness of Gloucester could explain
why the trades recorded in Hardwicke are so few. In
1608 there were 5 tailors, 2 smiths, a weaver, and a
carpenter; (fn. 77) in 1671 a broadweaver there took an
apprentice, (fn. 78) and there was a forge in 1672. (fn. 79) In the
early 19th century about a quarter of the population
was supported by trade or handicraft rather than by
agriculture, but the proportion fluctuated widely. (fn. 80)
The parish had a carpenter, a builder, a wheelwright, and a butcher up to the 1920's, and a blacksmith, shoemakers, and a coal merchant up to the
Second World War. (fn. 81)