Summary
It began with a sense of adventure and anticipation. Families gathered in working teams, waiting for the set-off. There was gossip, singing and caterwauling. And then: 'the man on the chestnut horse drew a large handbell from his saddle pouch. At the sound of the bell, a roar rose up from the crowd
of the sort that Daisy had only ever heard before outside the football grounds, as hundreds of women and children dived as fast as they could into one or other of the green alleys, shouting and jostling'.See the full content of this document
Extract
For Londoners, Working the Harvest Would Be a Haven, a Warm Memory in Cold Times Memoir Hopping: The Hidden Lives of an East End Hop- Picking Family by Melanie Mcgrath Fourth Estate, Pounds 15.99, 320 Pp Leo Hollis Praises an Evocation of the Hop-Picking Holidays That Gave East Enders a Taste of Eden
It was summer 1914, and teenaged Daisy Crommelin, born in the dockland squalor of Poplar, had been led away from London to the fields of Kent for the hopping season. From that moment on -...
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