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The Story of the Coprolite Industry in Little

and Great Eversden

 

Following the discovery in the late-1840s that the fossils in the Cambridge Greensand were a matter of commercial proposition a new industry began that was to have enormous impact on many villages in the Eastern counties. Known by the trade name of coprolites, the fossil deposit contained not just phosphatised droppings of creatures living in the seas and on the coastal plains of Cretaceous Britain but also the teeth, bones, scales and claws of dinosaurs. The more famous dinosaurs of iguanodon, megalosaurus, dakosaurus, dinotosaurus and craterosaurus were found, as well as the marine reptiles of ichthyosaurus, pliosaurus and plesiosaurus and the bird pterodactyl. But it wasn't just dinosaurs. Fossils of prehistoric shark, whales, elephant, hippopotamus, oxen, bear and horse were excavated as well as fossilised trees and numerous marine organisms - the most notable being ammonites.

 

Not only were they of interest to the students of the new science of geology but also the religious academics hotly debating Darwin's controversial theory of evolution. Many drawing room had its fossil collection and the country's museums had shelves filled with fossils from the Greensand. But the main reason why they were extracted was not for the pursuit of academic science but commercial reasons.

 

Britain's growing urban population during the Industrial Revolution needed feeding. Experiments to increase food production included adding a whole range of materials to the soil. Blood, bones, soot, fish, seaweed, chalk, clay and even rags were trialled. The most effective was animal bones but the nation's farmers couldn't supply the demand. The battlefields of Europe were scoured for bones, the pyramids of Egypt were emptied of mummified cats and even Italian catacombs were reported robbed for their bones. Loaded onto ships they were taken back to the “dens” of the coastal manure manufactories. Britain was described as a “ghoul searching the continents for bones to feed its agriculture.” So, when a cheaper and abundant deposit of fossil bones was discovered in Cambridgeshire there was, as the local historian, Richard Grove, described, “The Cambridgeshire Coprolite Mining Rush.”

 

Chemical analysis of the nodules showed them to contain between 50 - 60% calcium phosphate. Ground to a powder and dissolved in sulphuric acid the resultant mass was superphosphate of lime - the world's first artificial chemical manure. Manure manufacturers from Ipswich and London cashed in on this cheaper raw material than the other popular manure of its day - guano.

 

They were first worked in Burwell in 1846 and pits opened in Chesterton in 1849. The deposit was found a few metres beneath the chalk marl lying above the gault clay. It was simply a matter of a coprolite contractor getting an agreement with the landowner to raise the fossils. He then took on a gang of labourers, bought a horse or steam-operated washmill and some tools and started digging. On average £100 an acre was paid and about 250 tons were raised from each acre (0.404ha.). A trench was dug at one side of the field with the topsoil and subsoil on one bank. Once the fossil seam was exposed pick axes and shovels were used to extract it and, thrown into wheelbarrows, piled near a mill ready for washing and sorting. The seam averaged about 39cm. thick but in places was over a metre. The soil above the seam on the new face was removed after undercutting it and thrown into the trench behind. Backfilling meant the labourers gradually progressed across the field and onto adjoining property where a new lease was sought.

 

The Eversdens were among the first Cambridgeshire villages where the coprolites were worked. Although there has been little documentation in the way of maps and legal documents showing agreements between landowners and coprolite contractors, it has been noted that they had started as early as 1856. ( Kelly’s Post Office Directory 1869; Pennings and Jukes-Browne, ‘Geol. of Cambs.” 1881)

 

A fascinating insight into the effect of the diggings on the area was recorded in an account of the life story of Annie Macpherson, who moved into Little Eversden in 1858 with her parents to stay with their aunt.

 

Just at this time the discovery was made that the fossils embedded in the clay soil of that neighbourhood formed, when ground to powder, a valuable manure for the land. Within a week about 500 rough miners and labourers poured into the quiet little villages, and the pressing need was felt of efforts to civilise and evangelise these men, not only for their own sakes, but to save the rustics of the villages from the contamination brought about by the drunken and loose habits of these invaders of their peace, and the immorality induced by the absence of any provision for lodging and sleeping accommodation for this unprecedented addition to the countryside.•

 

(Birt,Lilian “The Children‘s Home Finder,•(1931),pp.9-14)

 

There were numerous cases in other villages which suggest there were quite serious problems with the diggers and, as shall be seen later, she had a difficult task. Unfortunately there has been little documentation as to the exact locations of the early diggings and the 1861 census gave no indication as no-one was mentioned as employed in either Great or Little Eversden. If there was a gang of labourers it was not recorded but there is the possibility local farm labourers were employed who did not describe themselves as fossil or coprolite labourers. (Cambs.R.O. 1861 census)

 

The usual practise for landowners of fields where the coprolite bed was suspected, was to arrange to have someone dig a test pit or take a bore sample to ascertain its depth, extent and quality and then arrange for the tenant farmer to raise them or set up a lease with a contractor to work them. Contractors paid a royalty for each acre worked as well as compensation to the tenant farmer for the land lost to the diggings. On December 17th 1862, Mrs Mary Royston allowed William Coulson, a contractor from Milton, to raise them from Low Close. He had recently been working pits in Whitwell, Barton and in Ashwell. (Cambs.R.O.Francis Bill Books,1862 p.475; See author's accounts of Barton,Ashwell )

 

 Another contractor, John Bennet Lawes, who was well on his way to making an immense personal fortune from having patented the technique of converting these coprolites to a very popular artificial fertiliser, had made an arrangement with another landowner. This may have been on Lord Hardwick‘s estate in the parish as Lawes’ surveyor, George Beaver, made several entries in his diary relating to his visits to the area.

 

“On Wednesday 16th September 1863 I go to Little Eversden in Cambs. to measure some coprolite lands being dug there by J.B. Lawes workmen etc.”

 

(Hitchin Museum,George Beaver‘s diary, pp.75a,75b)

 

The following summer there was another entry, “On 21st May 1864 I go to Little Eversden to measure coprolite diggings on Lord Hardwick‘s estates there.” (Ibid. Beaver,p.76b ) Unfortunately, none of these agreements have come to light but Lord Hardwick, according to his nephew, amassed the sum of £5,000 per year from his coprolite royalties, with one of the Ashwell families, the Fordhams, responsible for much of the work on his estate. (Royston Crow, 1891; See author's account of Ashwell) Whether the Fordhams had any dealings here is not recorded.

 

In 1864, at a parish vestry meeting in Great Eversden, it was agreed that Henry Wilkerson should be allowed to take the coprolites that had been found in the parish clay pits for the sum of £40. These must have been the old brickpits on the east side of “Claypit Hill”, but the following October, it was admitted that these pits were mostly exhausted. (Cambs. R.O. Eversden Parish Vestry Minute Book 1864)

 

Extra light on what was going on was provided in 1866 by Rev. J. B. Ridout, the vicar of Bourn. Following widespread concern about child labour in agriculture and the new factories he contributed evidence to the Commissioners.

 

“Of late years many of our young men have earned wages at coprolite digging and therefore, I believe, the farmers have wanted, at particular times, all the labourers young and grown up, and when wages are low the parents are too glad to send their children”.

 

Parliamentary Papers 1867 - 8 XVII “1st Report of the Commissioners of the Employment of Children, Young persons and Women in Agriculture.• p.506

 

The many young men may well have been taken on in Eversden pits or other workings in the neighbourhood but exactly where has not been determined. Lawes’ account books for 1867 show that between 1st July and 31st December he had two workings in the parish on Mill Field. He paid £27 11s. 9d. for levelling No.1. On Mill Field No. 2 his labourers raised 176 tons 6 cwt. at a cost of £305 6s. 1½d. This included £191 18s. labour costs, £57 10s. royalty to the Earl of Hardwick and £66 17s. for carriage to Deptford. This averaged £2 1s. 3d per ton. (Rothamsted Research: Archives B8.3).

 

The same year Lord Hardwick enquired of the parish for a donation or leave to dig gravel on his land at Great Eversden to repair the roads much damaged by “traffic of coprolites”. (Cambs.R.O. Eversden Parish Vestry Minutes, 1864; Correspondence with A.J.N. Richards, Ambleside, Little Eversden )

 

By the end of the 1860s the industry had acquired considerable attention, enough for it to be acknowledged in the local trade directory for Great Eversden.

 

There is a species of small fossil found in this and surrounding neighbourhoods, called coprolites, which have now become an article of commercial importance in Cambridge, the land being bought temporarily for their collection and then passing back to the original owners”.

 

 (Kelly‘s Post Office Directory 1869 )

 

It mentioned that “coprolites have been dug here since 1856” and included Henry Wilkerson's advert as a “Coprolite and Manure Merchant”. His success in the business in this area was shortlived, however, as he fell into financial difficulties with St.John‘s College. He had an agreement with them to raise the fossils from their farm in Steeple Morden and was expected to compensate the tenant farmer for land out of cultivation. As he owed him several hundred pounds the college put a distress notice put on him. It didn't deter him as he went on to work in the newly discovered coprolite pits in Buckinghamshire where he was taken on as manager for a Wolverhampton firm of manure manufacturers. (O'Connor, B. 'The Buckinghamshire Coprolite Industry', Bucks. Record, 1990)

 

On the 20th April 1871 all his “Surplus Stock and Building Materials” at his coprolite works in Little Eversden was auctioned, details of which can be seen on page .. (Cambs.R.O. 296/B921.310) The sale realised £224 10s. 6d, but what was interesting was the attendance of many local coprolite contractors, eager to acquire some of his useful equipment for their works. Charles Road of Malton Farm, Orwell, bought 1,250 sleepers for the tramway at his coprolite works and a sixteen feet. (4.92m.) diameter slurry wheel. Colchester, who had numerous works along the coprolite belt, bought 500 sleepers as well as many smaller items and other contractors, like Baker of Barton, Carver of Whaddon, Coxall of Haslingfield, and Messrs. Wallis, Free and Ellis of Barrington bought such items as coprolite barrows, bags, belts and wheels etc. There were also local farmers there to purchase  equipment for their farms. (Ibid.) There must have been some surplus materials as in October Bidwell reported that there were “also 2000 sleepers for coprolite use together with large quantity of material used for that purpose.“  The sale realised a further £175 13s.2d. of which Mr Prime of Barrington paid the most. (CCRO. 296/B923.1).

 

There is the strong likelihood that the easiest worked seams had been worked out by 1871 and that deeper seams were being extracted. Wilkerson‘s difficulties had led many of the coprolite diggers he'd laid off to find alternative employment as the 1871 census revealed there was no-one in Little Eversden described as involved. There were twenty one in Great Eversden, however. Henry Wilkerson, aged 28, described himself as a “coprolite merchant” and William Mansfield, also 28, was the “foreman over labourers”. Nineteen described themselves as “coprolite diggers”, including 54 year old John Leeden who actually lived in a tent on the roadside with his wife and six children. Confirming Annie Macpherson‘s experience, seven of them were lodgers coming from the surrounding counties of Suffolk, Beds., Hunts., Herts. and one, William Pearson, the eldest at 57, from as far away as Westmorland. The youngest was a lad of 16 yet the average age was 29, somewhat older than in other villages where the diggings were taking place.

 

In nearby Kingston 53-year old Henry Mills of Witeman‘s Lane was the only one involved. He was described as a “Coprolite Labourer Ganger“ and must have been one of those responsible for bringing in the outsiders. Maybe he hired some of the men described as agricultural or general labourers? There were also two coprolite foremen living at Caxton End in Bourn,, about three miles away. 30-year old William Watson and his 26-year old brother Charles lived with their father Phillip who was a local farmer. Maybe he had local fields dug by his sons? Another son, Alfred, was a coal merchant who probably supplied the contractors with the coal needed for steam pumps and washmills. (Cambs.R.O 1871 census)

 

The same year the Parish vestry group rated the coprolite works in the parish and their minutes revealed, “Rates of Coprolite Works - the Engine and Land £100. Horse Mill £50.“ Unfortunately the minutes gave no details of who was rated or where the mills were. However, it gave some perspective on the relative wealth of the industry when the Brick Kiln, which was being operated by Mr Grey of Cambridge, was only rated at £20. (Correspondence with A.J.N. Richards, Ambleside, Little Eversden) A church account book showed that in 1871 the vicar, Thomas York, paid off twenty-five years fee farm rent for Rectory Farm for only £20. It previously had been sixteen shillings (£0.80) an acre. The farm had gravel pits, lime pits and meadow and must have been earlier let out for diggings as it stated “money obtained by digging coprolites”. (Cambs.R.O. P70/1/2) It seems likely that Rev. York allowed the farmer to raise the fossils. Whether he had a formal agreement written up is uncertain as none have come to light. Officially he would have had an agreement with the Church Commissioners. Given the coprolite royalties being paid at the time were as high as £150 then £20 was a very small proportion of the potential income Rev. York had made.

 

According to the history of the village found in the Victoria County History, in the autumn of 1871 a licence was written up allowing the diggings to start from 23rd March the following year. (V.C.H. ref. Land Revenue Dept. Eversden, 8th Nov. 1871) Who the contractor was, what royalty and in which fields was not stated. More light was shone on the arrangement in one of Charles Bidwell's account books. He was an experienced Cambridge coprolite surveyor who had been asked by Rev. W. M. Campion, the Rector of St. Botolph‘s church, to find out about a field on Rectory Farm.

 

“3a.1r.4p. Land to be bought by Rev. W.M. Campion, as Rector of St. Botolph... the remaining portion of the field containing 3a.3r.8p. is bought by the same living as an investment from coprolite money raised in the parish of Eversden valued at £200”.

 

 (Cambs.R.O. Bidwell 21 p.383)

 

Where on Rectory Farm and who was responsible was not stated but the vicar of Harlton, Rev. O. Fisher, had a geological paper published in 1871 which referred to “a coprolite pit now in work below the lime-kiln at Eversden.“ (Fisher, O. ‘The Coprolite Pits of Cambridgeshire,‘ Q.J.G.S. viii, 1871 ,p.66)

 

The first geological map of the area clearly marked the junction of the chalk marl with the gault clay along which the Cambridge Greensand outcropped. It was along here that the coprolites were worked and the sketch on page  .. shows “Obliterated Coprolite Workings“ extending for about a mile to the west of Great Eversden towards Kingston and also on the slight ridge stretching northeast towards St. Helen‘s and Church Farm in Little Eversden. The first 25“ map of the area showed what appear to be two coprolite mills. One was on the roadside by the stream just southwest of Armshold Farm and the other at the end of a tramway which led down the slope, past a well which would have supplied the works with water and down to several sheds on the roadside by Claypit Hill. (Whitaker, W. ‘Water Supply of Cambs.‘ Mem.Geol.Surv. London, (1921),p.70)

 

Subsequent evidence from another Bidwell survey completed  in July 1876 revealed that part of Queen‘s College, Cambridge‘s estate of Manor Farm in Great Eversden had been dug by Mr. Wallis. This was probably Mr Wallis of Haslingfield referred to earlier. He was a coprolite contractor well connected with the Cambridge Manure Company and their Duxford manure factory. He supplied them with coprolites as a result of numerous agreements with other landowners in the area, including Barrington, Barton, Bassingbourn, Haslingfield, Coton, Grantchester, Steeple Morden and Barton-le-Clay over in Bedfordshire. Unfortunately, no agreements, maps or correspondence have emerged to shed light on his workings in the Eversdens except a note by Bidwell that the tenant, Ino Banks,

 

...complains that this particular part of the land was badly dug over and levelled when the coprolites were raised - there may be some truth in the allegation, but the chief point is that the land required deeper cultivation and more labour expended on it... The coprolite land which has been recently dug by Mr. Wallis has been levelled and restored in a satisfactory manner. Mr. Wallis has left some of his plant on the land which should be removed without delay so that the land may be cultivated at once.

 

(Cambs.R.O..Bidwell,30 pp.318-20)

 

When Wallis died in 1876 his son, also called Swann, continued the business but there was no indication the work continued in Eversden itself. By this time most of the easily accessible seams had been exhausted.  Many of the labourers would have been laid off and, faced with parish relief, they either reverted to farm work or, as happened in many villages, they left the area to find better paid work in the factories of the growing industrial towns. It is possible a number of men were working in nearby parishes but there must have been financial difficulties to have led to the incident in 1878 in which a fossil digger was caught stealing.

 

William Longstaff, Fossil digger of Toft, was charged by Maltbery White, baker of Great Eversden, with stealing one 2 lb. loaf of bread from his cart in Toft, value 3 1/2d.”

(Royston Crow, March 15th 1878)

 

Whether there were still workings in the parish in the 1880‘s is uncertain but there were three coprolite diggers in Little Eversden according to the 1881 census. They were aged 23, 29 and 33 and may well have been working in nearby Orwell where 58 were employed on several diggings.

 

No evidence of any workings in Little or Great Eversden during the 1880s has come to light but, ten years later, the 1891 census shows there were still local pits in operation. 49 year old William Stearn was the only one recorded as a coprolite digger but there were six in Orwell and 17 in Haslingfield. (Cambs.R.O. 1891 census) Most pits in the area had ceased by the mid-1890s by which time overseas phosphate supplies made local coprolites uneconomic.

 

The local historian, E.M. Barraud, pointed out one social consequence of the work ceasing in the parish. Many licensed beer houses went out of business. “There is one such ex-pub in my own village - curiously “The Louse and Stocking,“ probably a corruption of “The Loosened Stocking.“ (Barraud, E. M. 'Coprolites in Cambridgeshire,'  Agriculture, Vol. 58, no.4, July 1951) Annie Macpherson throughout this period must have still been trying to win over the coprolite diggers and it was fascinating to discover she had a measure of success.

 

“It was not easy for a timid woman to approach these rough characters... at first her efforts were received with sneers and scoffing. Often she would spend hours in prayer before she could get enough courage to approach a gang of men or even say a word apart... Gradually she won a hearing and a quiet influence among them... (After a trip to a mission London she found new resources for) a new power was soon evidenced in Annie Macpherson‘s work among the coprolite diggers. Clubs, coffee rooms, evening classes, prayer meetings and mission services were carried on, not only in the evenings but at the dinner times in barns if no other place was available, or in the open fields. Many Cambridge undergraduates took part. At first the speakers were always men; it was unthought of that a woman should speak publicly... Miss Ellice Hopkins, whose father was a distinguished mathematical tutor at Cambridge, came over to address the gatherings of coprolite diggers and villagers. Ere Annie Macpherson left Cambridgeshire the fossil strata had been almost worked out in that immediate neighbourhood so that only the labour of the regular population was required but the result of her efforts were far reaching. A temperate, united band of pious young men had been gathered out, full of simple earnestness each seeking to work for God according to his measure of light time and talents.•

 

(Lilian Birt,•The Children‘s Home Finder,•(1931),pp.9-14)

 

Today there is little evidence that this unique industry ever existed in Little or Great Eversden and this short account has helped the lives of the many involved not to be forgotten. It also sheds extra light on the parish's social, religious and economic development during the latter half of the nineteenth century.

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