The old postcard of an “unnamed village” featured in the June 2020 issue of High Country History journal (p 37) is indeed Hatfield Broad Oak as suggested. The first clue is the brick building on the far left, with the hanging sign of a cockerel. On the opposite side of the street is a house with distinctive X-bracing on the front. And of course, there is the village pump. Anyone who knows Hatfield Broad Oak will recognise this as a view looking east along the High Street.
Today (July 2020) the Cock public house has just re-opened after lockdown. The pump is still in position, though not functioning, the lamp has been replaced by a flagpole, and the renewed finger-post is closer to the brick house on the right. Amazingly, all but one of the buildings depicted are still there, barely altered, at least on the outside. The people of the village in 1900 would still recognise this view today.
Looking more closely at the old photo, it must have been posed. Cameras needed quite long exposures at this time, and everyone would have had to keep still for several seconds to achieve clarity. Animals and children were notoriously difficult, so old photographs often show blurring of babies’ arms or dogs’ tails. The photographer may have composed the group of village boys in the foreground and asked the two people with bicycles to stand still. Other village people are watching, but much further away. Only the horse nearer the camera has caused blurring by swishing his fashionably docked tail.
The little girl with the bicycle is intriguing. She is not in everyday dress, with a white smock or pinafore over her clothes, like the girls in the far background. She seems to be in her Sunday best, with a lace collar and a brimmed hat decorated with a large flower. Her dress is longer and less full than expected for a child, so she looks like a miniature adult, apart from her loose hair. She must be from a wealthy family, especially as she has a child-sized bicycle. In 1897 a girl’s cycle was advertised in the newspapers for £10 – equivalent to about £1,000 today. The child in the advertisement is wearing the usual dress at this time for a girl.
But the main feature of this photograph, which sets it apart from the many other village street scenes of the era, is the presence of the two military gentlemen on horseback. Their slouch hats, with the left side of the brim pinned up, are characteristic of the Australian army and still used by them today. However, they were also worn by some British soldiers, often riflemen. The details of their uniforms are not clear enough to identify which regiment they come from, but the one nearest the camera carries a long stick, the mark of an officer. Behind his saddle flap is a light-coloured pouch. Its shape is a clue to its purpose. It contains spare horseshoes – one front and one back – and a set of nails. (Remember “For want of a nail the shoe was lost…”?)
What are these two smart military men doing in a sleepy country village? The date of 1900-ish is significant. Until 1899, slouch hats had the right brim pinned up, not the left, so this must be after that date. The Boer War broke out in the south of Africa in 1899 and lasted three years. At that time Britain had a well-trained but small regular army, and it soon became obvious as fighting proceeded that they urgently needed to recruit more men. There was no conscription, but recruiting officers would go round the country persuading young men to volunteer. The officers in the picture may well have been targeting the older brothers of the village boys around the pump. The agricultural depression in a corn-growing area like Hatfield Broad Oak meant that unemployment was high and wages were low. The offer of three meals a day and a chance of adventure would have appealed to many young men. But nationally, 30% to 40% of the volunteers failed the medical, mainly due to poor nutrition and lung disease. As anyone who has seen War Horse will know, the army also recruited farm horses for wars.
The Boer War was brutal on both sides. Twenty-two thousand soldiers from Britain and the Empire died, mostly of disease. 6,000 of them were killed in combat, and more died later of their wounds. Great cruelty was shown by the British to the civilian Afrikaner population, many of whom were deliberately starved in concentration camps. About 300,000 horses died: their average life expectancy in South Africa was just 6 weeks. 75,000 men were sent home sick or wounded. One of these was Major Harry Broke of Hatfield Heath, whose parents were so thankful for his survival that they donated the painted wooden reredos which is still in Hatfield Heath church. There are not many parish memorials to those who fought or died in the Boer War, only a few in large towns. The men of the Essex Regiment who lost their lives are all commemorated on an obelisk now in Bell Meadow Park, Chelmsford. In that class-conscious age, officers’ names are separate from and above those of other ranks.
Returning to the old photograph – it must have been a memorable day for the village. A travelling photographer appeared, with his cumbersome tripod and camera and mysterious blackout hood, and on the same day two dashing mounted recruiting officers turned up in time to be in his photograph. Occasionally major international events – wars or pandemics – sweep across a country, affecting even quiet rural villages like Hatfield Broad Oak. This photograph shows just such a moment in history, frozen in time.