|
The Thrashing Drum and Boby Unidresser
Beating the corn with flails to separate the straw from the grain was one of the most laborious jobs on the farm. In 1786, Alexander Meikle invented the first successful threshing machine to do this job, using a drum which revolved against a cover to detach the grain. The first machines were stationary and powered by men or horses. Later they were developed into portable ones driven by steam which could be taken from farm to farm. They were further improved to carry out other grain processing tasks like winnowing, (separating the husk from the grain by blowing through with a blast of air) dressing, (cleaning off the dust residue and the spike of the ear) and bagging.
The threshing machine at Cressing Temple is a late example supplied in 1941 by Marshalls of Gainsborough , Lincolnshire, a leading manufacturer of steam engines, tractors and agricultural equipment. Much of the bodywork is made of steel and the decking is of wood. The original steel wheels of the earlier machines have been replaced by inflatable tyres.
The machine was worked by a team of eight men. The sheaves, which had been stacked for several months to dry, were passed up to the top of the machine with pitchforks and carefully fed into the threshing drum. The grain poured into 220lb (100kg) sacks at the back of the machine. The straw was passed out of the front of the machine on a series of mechanical ratchets called 'straw-walkers' and built into stacks.
Our machine was used on the Hassobury estate in west Essex and donated to Cressing Temple by Mr and Mrs T. Lyons. It has been restored by A.D. Letch Ltd of Braintree and Barry Crouch of Essex County Council, with the aid of a grant from the Essex Heritage Trust.
The Boby Unidresser was installed at Ashes Farm, Cressing in 1954 and ran continuously throughout every harvest up to and including 1994. Whilst not all the grain produced on the farm was passed through the machine as a great deal was placed in the storage silos direct. The owner, Mr Peter Ratcliffe estimates that it processed 14,000 tonnes of wheat dressed, some 2,000 tonnes of barley, 1,000 tonnes of oats - 600 tonnes of peas and also 100 tonnes of clover seed. Additionally some of the harvest from the nearby Lanham Farm was cleaned through the machine; a formidable record for a small machine on a small farm. It is a tribute to its manufacture and design that it is still in fine working condition and almost as good as new.
The Unidresser now sits proudly in the south-east corner of the Wheat Barn as part of the main exhibition. There is a complete exhibition in the Well House devoted to the history of the seed industry in which Cressing Temple played a major role during the C20th.
|
