Rev. F. B. De Chair

The Rev. F Blackett De Chair officated for a number of services at Deopham between 1863 and 1890 in his capacity as Curate of Morley. The Rev. Hibbert Wanklyn was vicar of Deopham during this period.

The following is an extract from the 1865 Bishop’s Visitation record:

All rights reserved by Norfolk Record Office who hold the original;
their reference is NRO DN/VSB 14

In 1873 he presented a paper to the Pastoral Work Association in Norwich. Considering that he was based in an adjacent parish, one can reasonably assume that some of his references drew on Deopham experiences. It also gives an insight into issues that were simmering at this time but which gave rise to open hostility in Deopham a few years later in the time of the Rev. J.S. Treglown.
The text of De Chair’s paper is reproduced below.

The Clergy and the Labourers’ Movement.

BY THE REV. F. B. DE CHAIR, M.A.,
CURATE OF MORLEY.

MY LORD BISHOP, MY REV. BRETHREN,

THE subject for our discussion today is, The Clergy and the Labour Movement. I propose to consider it, in the paper I have been asked to read, not so much with a view to the duty of the Clergy as a body, towards the whole labour question now agitating the country, as the duty of, and the best course to be adopted by an individual clergyman in his own parish, in the state of things brought about by the Labour Movement. There is no doubt but that every village has been affected by it. Some more, some less, according to circumstances. It may be well therefore to take a glance at the state of things in general, as existing in most of our country parishes, before saying anything on the course to be adopted.

For years past there has been a bad feeling between the men and their masters. The men have been underpaid (as the masters are free to acknowledge.) They have been turned out of work on wet days, thus losing a portion of their weekly earnings. They have in many cases been harshly spoken to. Their interests, their comforts, their social improvement have by the farmers been too little thought of. In a word, they have been treated too much like machines and too little like men with minds, and souls, as well as bodies; and the consequence has been, that a bad feeling has been growing up, and the men, instead of respecting their masters, and having an interest in their prosperity, have regarded them (in too many cases) with feelings of opposition and dislike. I think I am not overdrawing the picture, for any one that has lived and laboured in a country village for only a few years, must have come to such a conclusion. This feeling, then, that has been smouldering for so long, has at length burst out into a flame. The men have combined together. The Labourers’ Union has been formed. They have asserted their right to a fair day’s wage for a fair day’s work. They, instructed by the Union, have set their own rate of pay, and hitherto what they have asked they have received. The farmers have come to their terms, so that the rate of wages now is higher than ever before (though not too high for men to live and keep their families), and the harvest wages the last two years far in excess of what has ever been paid before.

The labourers’ grievance, then, which did exist, has to a great extent been remedied, but the bad feeling still remains. The men as a body are not contented. We can probably in all our parishes point to some individual cases where our best, most sensible, and steadiest men are thankful to be better off, and would discourage further agitation. But this is not the rule. Most of the men, through the influence of the Union, having obtained their object thus far, believe that by the same means they can push matters further still, and are quite ready to act, as direction may be given. This of course separates the labourer still more widely from the farmer. He has received from his master what he has asked, but the farmer does not find that he is more trusted or respected, or that the work is better done. Indeed, on the contrary, he sees a growing spirit of independence amongst his men, and feels that the tables are being turned altogether; that he is becoming the servant while the men are taking the place of the master. And not only this, but that he is obliged to submit (if he would have his work done at all) to the dictation of a set of men who, he thinks, have no concern in the matter.

As the clergyman looks at this state of things, he sees there are in the parish two hostile forces arrayed the one against the other, instead of two classes working together for the mutual prosperity of each other; and as the one appointed to minister to the souls of all in the parish, he must be anxious to find out in what way he can bridge over this gulf, and cause these two sides to meet their differences in the spirit of Christians, and to do their duty the one to the other as brethren. But a difficulty meets him at once. The bad feeling between men and their masters does not end there, but is felt towards others. And if towards any body of men more bitterly than another, towards that body of which he is a member – the Clergy. He has been surprised, perhaps, since the Labourers’ Movement began in the neighbourhood, to see how some who always met him with a friendly greeting, now look the other way, or give him the coldest nod of recognition. He has noticed too how several of the men are now always absent from church, and on making inquiries he discovers that it is himself that is the cause of this; that the men believe it is entirely through him and the Clergy generally that they have been so badly paid in the past; and that while he has been living amongst them and ministering to them in God’s name, visiting them in their sickness and sorrow, supplying their wants with such comforts as they had not, denying himself, perhaps, to educate their children, interesting himself in their sons and daughters, and doing all he could conscientiously and faithfully for their highest welfare,– that all that time he has been their real oppressor, keeping them down, and depriving them of their rights. And who can wonder that they should entertain such views, when we remember that the complaint has too commonly been, when the labourer has reasoned with his master on the small pay he received, “I have to pay the tithe; only do away with the tithe, and we can give you better wages?”– and when we mark, too, how that at the Union meetings the Church and the Clergy are the special subjects of attack, and that a newspaper is circulated in connection with the Labourers’ Union, whose avowed object it seems to me, unless I have misread it altogether, is not only to set the men against the Clergy and the Church, but even against religion itself?

In order to shew that I have reason for such a statement, permit me to give a few extracts from the paper in question, which may not be known to everyone of us.

In a leading article in the Labourers’ Chronicle of September 6th, 1873, on the Church of England in its relation to the labouring classes, the writer, after describing the Church of England as the poor man’s heritage, and how it should be made to teach a religion such as the Labourers’ Union Chronicle thinks the poor man wants, and never has had, says: “We lay it to the charge of the Church of England, that as the accredited religious instructor of the people, it has put falsehood in the place of truth, and given to the people the stone of a sacrament or the chaff of a doctrine in place of the True Bread of Life.”

Again, in an article on the Church in relation to the labouring classes, in the issue of October 11th, 1873, on the Act of Uniformity, the writer says: “The labourer who tills fairly and honestly the soil of the fields, and wins from it a harvest of nourishing food, looks to the Clergy to do their part in rightly cultivating his mind, in giving him the highest and truest guidance in the spiritual affairs of life. But what does he find? He finds that the Clergy have made themselves slaves to obsolete doctrines, have pledged themselves to walk by the dim religious light that shone on the darkened minds of the sixteenth century, and that they dare not, and must not, and cannot guide him by the clear and bright light that God permits to shine on the free and open and reverent mind of to-day. On behalf, then, of the labouring classes, we impeach the Clergy of the Church of England of gross and shameful neglect of the high duties which the nation has entrusted to them. We impeach them of moral delinquency, and moral cowardice in submitting as they do to the degrading bondage of the Act of Uniformity. We impeach them of scandalising the high office they have undertaken of witnessing the eternal truths of God, by slavishly subscribing their allegiance to the fallible doctrines and commandments of men. We say that the evil of a corrupt Clergy is a canker that is sapping the spiritual work of our national life. A serf Clergy can never properly train a free people, and the people, the moment that the power is with them to do so, will emancipate themselves from their influence and teaching.”

Yet again, in an article on “Our Educators,” October 11th, 1873, while admitting the Clergy have taken the lead in education, the writer goes on to say, “it was not, and it is not, because they wished to give the very best teaching to those who required it; but because they wished to extend and maintain their particular view of that which is but one branch of education, viz., religion.”

And, again, in same issue. In reply to an article on the Union by Canon Girdlestone, who complained that the Clergy were always being attacked, the writer says, “The labourers do not require, and do not receive, any attempt to persuade them that the Clergy are their worst enemies. They have known it from their infancy. They hold it as they do that they are Englishmen.”

And in the issue of October 18th, in an article against the Bishop of Oxford’s paper at the Bath Church Congress, the writer says, “Truthful, honest, and intelligent men cannot enter the Church’s ministry,…. a Church of England Clergyman, before he can enter upon his office, has to swear a solemn belief in doctrines to which the whole of modern scholarship gives the lie, and in creeds that are utterly unbelievable.”

With such teaching as this, with such influence brought to bear upon our labouring classes, who can wonder if they do believe the clergyman to be their foe? And this adds another to the many difficulties in his way in this matter. What is he to do? He remembers that his calling is spiritual, that he is ordained to watch for the souls of his people, and that he has a concern not only in one class of his parishioners, but in all. And although it is his duty to do all in his power for the social and temporal advantage of his people, yet he feels he must be very careful (in any course he may adopt) lest he undermine his spiritual influence, or alienate any from his ministry. And this, I think, he cannot fail to do if he takes any prominent part on one side or the other. If he throws himself on the labourers’ side, he at once alienates all the farmers! If he throws himself on the farmers’ side, he at once alienates all the labourers! If he does not associate himself with the one side more than the other, but takes a prominent part in advising between the two, the chances are that the farmers will dislike his interference, and his counsel be too strong for the men. The true course, it seems to me, for the clergyman-if he is to retain his spiritual influence-is to hold a neutral position. And this he is quite able to do, while at the same time he uses his influence to bring about a more happy state of things, and to teach his people, whatever their condition, that they are brethren, and have a duty each one towards another.

I will try to point out what I humbly venture to think may be the course of one acting in this spirit. There are certain things he will feel it best to avoid, certain things he will feel it right to do.

1. He will not preach on the subject. It may seem strange perhaps, when a question like this is agitating the agricultural districts, that any one should advise silence concerning it in the pulpit. At first no doubt many of the Clergy who intended themselves to stand aloof and be neutral, thought the pulpit the very place from which to say their say, and give the movement a right direction. And if we could have been sure of such a result it would have been a wise course; but on second thoughts, the success of such a measure seemed doubtful. They who knew the mind of the people, and who have found out by experience how easily they are misunderstood in their teaching, if not in the actual words they speak, yet in the ideas they set forth, and the motives by which they are actuated, feared lest when they would do good evil only would arise; that the labourer would think (if the clergyman ventured to give any Christian advice on the subject) that he was altogether against him, and thus his action would make the labourers more prejudiced against the Clergy than before, and the farmers would be offended at his making any allusion at all to a subject which they think does not concern him. I have not heard of a single case where preaching on the movement has done real good. I have heard of cases where it has done harm, inasmuch as the labourers have stayed away from church in consequence, and a bad feeling has been aroused against the clergyman.

2. He will not lend the school-room for Union meetings. Probably not many of us have been asked to do this. And yet this is one of the great grievances of the Union against the Clergy, that the school-rooms have not been offered for their meetings and that they have been driven to the public-houses. A clergyman who lends his school-room for Union meetings seems to me to take a most decided part with the labourer. If the Union were an organization simply to redress the wrongs of the labourer, and if he were so crushed and downtrodden by the farmer that he had no power to lift himself up; then, just as it would undoubtedly be the clergyman’s place to throw himself altogether on his side, so he might well allow meetings in the school-room. But this is not the state of things. The farmers have acceded to the labourers’ demands, and the Union now is a combination against the farmer to get from him all that is to be had. It is a class movement, and to lend the village school, which is the property of the whole parish, to one class to take their counsel against another, is certainly not to be neutral.

A Cambridgeshire vicar, in a letter to the Spectator a few weeks back, describes how he had thrown himself from the first on the labourers’ side, how he had allowed the Union meetings to be held in the school-room, and blames the Clergy in general for not acting in the same way; but he goes on to add that all his farmers were hereditary Dissenters, while his labourers were Church people. It is just possible that if it had been with him as with most of us the majority of the farmers Church people, and the Dissenters chiefly from among the labourers -he would have adopted a different plan. At all events in his case there were no farmers to alienate, and all the labourers to please.

3. He will not show any opposition to Unionists. When the Union first was started, there was so great a feeling against it that those who joined it were looked upon with suspicion, and treated differently from others. Whoever may think it right to adopt such a course, I venture to think the clergyman who would be neutral must not. The labourer has as much right to combine for his interests as any other man, and long as he conducts himself in a right spirit and proper manner, he ought to be treated with the same kindness and respect as before. The clergyman should not omit him, or any of his, in his visits, gifts, or parochial benefit clubs; or do or say anything to make him feel that he is looked down upon because he has joined the Union.

4. He will not farm land himself. It seems to me impossible for a clergyman to farm, and to hold at the same time a neutral position between farmer and labourer. I speak, of course, of a beneficed clergyman. If he farms a sufficient number of acres to make him employ two or three men, he becomes interested in the rate of wages, and, whatever his own feelings or intentions, the labourers will regard him as on the farmers’ side. They will be slow to listen to any advice from him: they will accept it with great suspicion and distrust, for they will believe (whether rightly or wrongly) that his interests must be opposed to their own.

These are some of the things which, in my opinion, he will think it best to avoid. I pass on to mention certain things he will feel called upon to do.

1. To preach and teach more firmly than ever the grand old truths of the Christian faith.
One of the most alarming signs of this movement is, that it tends to foster a spirit, if not of actual infidelity, yet, of indifferentism to Christianity. In those places where, since the Union was formed, the labourers have been noticed to stay away from church, it has been remarked that while a few have become Dissenters (from whatever cause) the greater number have gone to no place of worship; that they seem to throw over all thought of religion altogether. And no wonder! when they are told, as they are told by the organ already quoted, that “in this en- lightened nineteenth century a new gospel is wanted; that the old religion which has been taught in the churches, and has been re-echoed in the meeting- houses, is altogether worn out; that the whole system needs to be recast; that instead of being taught to secure a fancied salvation from a fabled curse in the next world, they must be taught of a Kingdom of Heaven here on earth, a Paradise in this world, wherein every man is to have his rights, and in which liberty, fraternity, and equality, conceived of in their truest, highest, and noblest sense, is to be enjoyed by all.” Surely now, if ever, we need to go back and back again to the old foundation truths of the Christian religion, and declare them with all the simplicity and power we can command; to tell it out with no uncertain sound, that the curse is no fable, nor the salvation to be secured from it anything fancied, but both the one and the other a great reality; that Paradise on earth, in any sense, can be enjoyed only by those that know that salvation; and that the only liberty, fraternity, and equality that can ever hold together here is that which makes men think more of their duties than their rights, viz., the liberty, the fraternity, and equality of the living members of the body of Christ. Plain, simple, and earnest teaching of the doctrines and precepts of the Gospel is needed now more than ever, in every village-in the church, in the school, and from house to house.

2. To use his personal influence in private with both masters and men as opportunity may occur.
A clergyman who takes no prominent part may, in a quiet way, by a word dropped here or there, in a pastoral visit, or in ordinary conversation by the wayside, exert a wholesome influence. He may thus lead both masters and men to act as brothers bound to consider each other, and not as if all they had to think of was how much money on the one side, and how much work on the other. He can plead with the farmer for the labourer; he can plead with the labourer for the farmer; and thus be a peacemaker, and help to smooth over difficulties while no one notices that he takes part at all. But such an influence he will fail to possess, if he has ever shewn himself prominently forward on one side or the other; for on the opposite side there will be a prejudice against him.

3. To witness against the increasing luxury and extravagance of the present time.
One of the great charges brought against the Clergy is, that while they have not taught the poor man his rights, they have not taught the rich man his duties. There may be too much truth, at all events, in the latter part of this charge. (It is possible that the labourers have heard more of their own duties than the squire and the farmers have heard of theirs.) The more extravagance and luxury there is among the rich, the more suffering must there be among the poor. However much the farmer may be rightly blamed for the low wages of the labourer in the past, surely in many cases there is blame deserved elsewhere. For how often has it happened that extravagance has been the cause of the rents being raised again and again, till the farmer has been so pressed that he could not treat his labourers as he would? The clergyman, then, who feels he cannot throw himself on the labourers’ side and openly support the Union, at least can do this;- he can bear his witness against such a style of living as results in the neglect of the poor, and in their poverty, and oppression. Let the labourers only feel that he is as ready to witness against the faults of those above him, as they know he is to witness against the faults of those beneath him, and they will believe in him far better than at present. And, if I may say so without presuming, let them see that he himself acts up to what he teaches; for there can be no greater stumbling-block to a labouring man than to see the one whose special calling it is to lead him from earth to heaven, living, himself and his household, (as far as all outward appearance is concerned) as if this earth and its affairs were the chief thing after all.

4. To make it a subject for special prayer that God may overrule the present state of things for His glory, the good of the Church, and the well-being of our country villages.
The present state of things does fill the mind of many a country clergyman with anxiety. It is not so much the dispute between capital and labour that distresses him, this he feels sure will work itself out and find its level in due time, but it is the evils arising out of it, evils in the way of his own spiritual work among his people, evils to religion itself, evils to the Church of which he is a minister, evils to the peace of society. He knows not what may be the end. But this he does know, that God’s overruling providence ordereth all things in heaven and earth, and, therefore, while he goes straight on in that path of duty which he thinks to be the right one under the circumstances in which he is placed, he is con- tented to leave the issue with God, and to pray Him to take away all hatred and prejudice, and whatsoever else may hinder from godly union and concord; and so to bring it to pass that all may be more and more of one mind and of one soul, united in one holy bond of truth and peace, of faith and charity.



Thus I have ventured to set forth what I have thought to be the duty of, and the best course to be adopted by, a clergyman in his parish in the state of things arising out of the Labour Movement. I have considered the subject, regarding the clergyman as a spiritual man who keeps his office and work in the foremost place, and who, in everything else that he does as well as in his ministry, would be as “wise as a serpent and yet as harmless as a dove.” There are points on which I have not touched which a clergyman, adopting such a course as I have described, may take part in, and especially the helping labourers to emigrate if they so desire it, and giving them information on the subject; but this did not seem to come prominently forward at the present time, though we may expect a stir on the subject in the course of a few months when Mr. Arch returns from Canada. I would only add that I could have wished it had fallen to the lot of some one more experienced than myself to handle a subject so important and difficult; yet, having been requested to write a paper, I have honestly stated what, in my opinion, is the best course, and I would earnestly beg my Reverend Brethren, whether they agree with me or think me wrong, to accept what I have said in the same spirit in which it has been offered to them.