Building record TQ 55 SE 170 - Ightham Mote hop pickers’ huts

Hop pickers huts are believed to still exist along the south edge of Martins Wood, Ightham. They are shown as one of a number of blocks on the 1st edition Ordnance Survey map (1862-1875) (1).

Designated as a listed building 8/4/26
Summary
Hop pickers’ huts built in the late nineteenth century on the Ightham Mote estate.

Reasons for Designation
The hop pickers’ huts at Ightham Mote, Kent, built in the late C19, are listed at Grade II for the following principal reasons:

Architectural interest:

* as exceptionally rare surviving examples nationally of unconverted purpose-built late C19 hop pickers’ huts;

* as comparatively well-preserved late C19 hop pickers’ huts with a legible plan form, illustrative of the best type of hop pickers’ accommodation on a relatively affluent estate.

Historic interest:

* as a physical manifestation and tangible reminder of an important industry in the social and agricultural history of this country whereby huge numbers of itinerant labourers and workers from Romany Gypsy and Irish Traveller communities, as well as working-class families from London travelled seasonally to work in the hop-fields of Kent and South East England;

* as a good representation of the change in hop pickers’ accommodation from tents or animal sheds to purpose-built brick huts following campaigns to improve the conditions of hop pickers in late C19 England.

Group value:

* as hop pickers’ huts surviving in their original farmstead and estate context with: Ightham Mote medieval moated manor house (Scheduled monument 1013120 and Grade I-listed building), East Mote Oasthouse (Grade II-listed), Mote Farm Oasthouse (Grade II-listed), Mote Farmhouse (Grade II-listed), Mote Farm cottages (Grade II*-listed) and the stable (Grade II-listed). These form an ensemble of exceptional interest covering nearly 700 years of historical development, as well as a highly legible survival of the hop industry.

History
Hops are thought to have been introduced to Britain by the Romans, but it was not until the C16 when Flemish weavers began to import their native beer that hops were harvested in England to brew beer. In Kent, with its fertile soil and mild climate, commercial and domestic cultivation of hops proliferated and by the mid-C17 a third of the national crop was produced in the county. The brewing industry expanded rapidly in the C18 and hop production peaked in the late C19.

Before mechanised picking was introduced in the 1950s, the harvesting of hops was a very labour-intensive process. Until the C19 these hop pickers were largely itinerant labourers and workers from Romany Gypsy and Irish Traveller communities. By the mid-C19 their numbers were bolstered by huge numbers of working-class families from south-east and east London, and further afield, who would leave their homes in the autumn to pick hops, particularly in Kent, Surrey, Sussex and Hampshire. Women and children often travelled independently of the men, who joined their families at the weekend. Londoners first walked and then travelled by road or train to the hop fields. Many families returned year after year to the same farm, making friendships with fellow pickers and developing a sense of community (Cordle 2011, 138). Thus ‘hopping’ was also a social phenomenon, and hand-picking hops lasted for 400 years as a way of life.

The South Eastern Railway ran ‘Hop Pickers’ Specials’ to transport Londoners to the countryside in the 1870s. Initially accommodation for workers included canvas tents, barns, stables, cattle sheds or pigsties. Dirty, overcrowded and unhygienic conditions led to health problems, including an outbreak of cholera at East Farleigh, Kent, in September 1849, which killed 43 hop-pickers (Sutherland and Walton 1995, 6). During the 1860s there were campaigns led by Reverend J Y Stratton and Reverend J J Kendon to improve the conditions of hop pickers. In 1866 the ‘Society for Employment and Improved Lodgings for Hop Pickers’ was formed. The first bylaws covering hop pickers’ accommodation were adopted at Bromley, Kent under the 1874 Sanitary Acts Amendment Act, and subsequently many districts of Kent adopted laws. Purpose-built hop pickers’ huts, or hopper’s huts as they were also known, were erected. Towards the end of the C19, Father Richard Wilson, vicar of St Augustine's, Stepney, founded hospitals for the treatment of hop pickers whilst the Salvation Army also attended to hop pickers’ welfare (Filmer 1992, 44). Among these hospitals is the Grade II-listed Hoppers Hospital at Capel, Kent, founded in 1910 (List entry 1251320).

The standard size of a hopper’s hut was 9 feet by 9 feet or 8 feet by 10 feet (Sutherland and Walton 1995, 9). Initially huts were constructed of timber but following the abolition of the brick tax in 1850 brick huts were built, often clad in corrugated iron sheets. It was unusual to have a single hut built; farmers most often constructed lines or blocks of huts. From about the 1930s, some hopper’s huts were also constructed of breeze blocks, whilst Nissen huts were another form of accommodation. Huts usually had an earth floor and were lit by candles or paraffin lamps. Eventually water was provided via a standpipe, dedicated toilets were erected, usually with an earth closet, and a dedicated cookhouse was often built. Furniture inside the huts was arranged by the pickers themselves, usually with very basic beds; initially faggots (bundles of brushwood) placed under a bedding of straw but by the 1920s palliasses (straw mattresses) and ticks (linen mattress covers) were widely used (Ibid, 9). In the C20 hop picking eventually began to be looked upon as a holiday, offering a change of scenery for many Londoners. However, mechanisation in the 1950s led to a decline in the need for hop pickers or their huts. Surviving purpose-built huts are now rare; most have been demolished or converted to other uses.

Ightham Mote is one of the best-preserved medieval moated manor houses in England (Scheduled monument 1013120 and Grade I List entry 1362410). A ‘home hop garden’ is recorded at Ightham Mote in the 1839 tithe survey when the estate was owned by Elizabeth Selby. Hop pickers’ huts are recorded elsewhere on the estate at Greyberry Wood as early as 1784 but those no longer survive. The Ightham Mote hop pickers’ huts were built in the late C19. They are shown on the 1896 OS map within Martin’s Wood. The census dated 31 March 1901 records 14 people staying at the huts, including several couples and two children. The building has seen some later alterations. A central partition, which would likely have divided the building into at least 10 huts, has been partially removed. On the north side are five C20 casement windows where there may originally have been doorways. There are further indications in the brickwork of an additional blocked opening on each side. The roof was replaced in the early C21.

Details
Hop pickers’ huts. Built in the late C19.

MATERIALS: red stock-brick laid in stretcher bond and red clay tile roof coverings.

PLAN: a long rectangular building now divided into five huts with separate doorways but originally there may have been further partitions to form at least 10 huts.

EXTERIOR: purpose-built hop pickers’ huts comprising a single-storey block divided into individual huts under a gabled roof. Each hut has a wooden-boarded door approached by brick steps to the south elevation and a C20 two-light casement window to the north elevation; the windows may be in place of former doorways on this side which would have provided a second set of huts. There are possible indications of one additional opening on each side which may have been blocked at a later date. At each gable end is a corbelled chimney stack; these may have been added later.

INTERIOR: each hut was originally partitioned off from the rest by a north-south brick wall; later doors have been inserted into the south end of each wall so that all can now be accessed. An additional brick partition wall may originally have run axially east-west through the centre of the building. This partition remains in place to the central hut, and above a later roof timber to the remaining huts. At each end is a segmental-headed brick fireplace with a brick and stone rubble surround and a brick hearth. There is an early C21 common rafter side-purlin roof structure. (2)

<1> National Trust, National Trust website (Website). SKE52192.

<2> Historic England, National Heritage List for England (Index). SKE29372.