WHAT MATERIAL IS THERE?
There is a wide variation in how diligently highway authorities carried out the work of creating the first definitive map of rights of way. Some were very thorough and others were not. There is also wide variation in how much material has been retained in local archives and by highway authorities.
So one of your first jobs should be to check with the county archive to find out what exists. You can ask the staff, or search the catalogue using terms like “rights of way” and “definitive map.”
There may be some material in parish records, but in my experience this is usually very scanty.
The authority may have retained some material instead of depositing it with an archive. Do check with them whether or not this is the case.
WHY THE MATERIAL IS IMPORTANT
There are two main reasons:
1) Material about a particular route will show you whether or not it was considered an, if so, why it was accepted or rejected. This is important for your arguments.
2) You have to provide new evidence in order to have your application considered. Looking at the definitive map material will tell you what the authority has already looked at.
EAST SUSSEX AS AN EXAMPLE
I am the convenor of the Sussex “Don’t Lose Your Way” group and in that capacity I have examined nearly all of the first definitive map material available in the East Sussex County Archive (with the exception of some of the initial forms completed by the parishes) and also the material made available to me by the East Sussex Rights of Way team. I catalogued much of their material in return for access to their digital files.
Researchers are fortunate that most of the relevant material for the current county of East Sussex survives and that the county were quite thorough.
What you find is likely to differ, but the example gives you an idea of what you ought to be looking for.
THE PROCEDURE
The County first wrote to parishes in its area asking them to mark in pencil on a map all the rights of way they believed to exist in the parish and to make up a schedule for each one, showing things like gates and stiles, the status (footpath, bridleway etc.) and whether or not the landowner admitted the right of way.
Walking groups, most particularly the Ramblers Association, were asked to walk the routes identified and report on what they found. They were also asked to add any routes that they thought that the parish had missed out.
In parallel, county staff looked at all the quarter sessions highways decisions (which they catalogued), all the plans for railways that were built and all the inclosure orders in the county.
This fed into the creation of the provisional, draft and then the first definitive map and statement.
THE MATERIAL AVAILABLE
The material includes:
- The maps originally annotated by the parishes or their representatives to show routes that they believed to be rights of way
- Forms completed by or on behalf of the parishes to accompany these maps, giving details of routes believed to be rights of way.
- The survey of those routes by members of the Ramblers Association or other walking clubs giving reports of what they found when walking the above routes
- Various iterations of the draft and final definitive maps
- Committee minutes of the rights of way subcommittee which dealt with objections to the draft definitive map.
In many cases a considerable amount of correspondence between the county council and the parishes, both generally and about specific routes, survives including the observations made by the county council on the initial surveys. There are also a lot of notes which appear to have been from county council staff, about historical records they had examined.
It is therefore possible to draw conclusions about the thoroughness, or otherwise, of the process. I noted the following:
LACK OF LOCAL KNOWLEDGE ON THE GROUND
In quite a number of cases the parish survey was completed by the same person who did the Ramblers Survey. Correspondence suggests that in a few cases the parish council had no idea how to carry out a survey of rights of way and had to be pointed in the direction of a walking group.
While it is likely that a walker would be diligent in finding all the rights of way that they could, it meant that all the work of identifying paths depended on one person. However good their local knowledge it is likely that this led to omissions.
It is also the case that walkers might have very little knowledge of equestrian use, leading to under recording.
Although the county council did some checks (see below), if a route was missed at this stage there was only limited opportunity to pick it up again.
DISINCLINATION TO RECORD
My current experience is that parish councils have strong land owner representation. This would have been even more the case at the time of the survey.
It is, of course, almost impossible to identify cases where paths were “suppressed” but there are some examples recording that this happened.
Lewes Borough council failed to record some routes. However when it was pointed out to them that they had recorded them in an earlier survey, they replied that they preferred the routes to be discretionary.
In Glynde, where only two rights of way were recorded, and where the Glynde estate owns most of the parish, the parish council passed a motion to the effect that there were absolutely no more rights of way in the parish and that in particular there was no right of way whatsoever along Glynde reach (even though landowners upstream in other parishes had admitted such a route).
Where the route was “suppressed” in both the 1932 and the definitive map surveys it was unlikely to be picked up.
DISCOUNTING OF RAMBLERS COMMENTS
Those surveying the paths on foot were encouraged to add routes that they thought had been missed out and it is noticeable that in many cases where the surveyor had not compiled the parish survey there were a number of additions. Walkers reported routes that were obviously used, or which appeared to be rights of way for other reasons.
However these do not seem to have gone anywhere. In very few cases are comments from the county council recorded which ask the parishes to consider these routes. In most cases these routes do not appear on the definitive map.
This appears to have been a flaw in the definitive map process although it will be argued that the Ramblers could have objected when the draft map was published omitting recommended routes.
LACK OF CHECKING AGAINST HISTORICAL RECORDS
As you might expect, there is little evidence of parish councils or walking groups examining historical records.
The county council, however, worked very hard to examine some historical records:
These included:
- Quarter sessions records
- Deposited plans for railways that have been built
- Inclosure records
- Some tithe records
- The 1932 survey of rights of way. This had been carried out by all district councils in the area (The results are now mostly lost)
This resulted in the addition or changing of status of a number of routes, indicating the collective memory of parishes and walkers was not faultless.
However the process was not faultless. For example in Folkington two quarter sessions orders created 2 bridleways and one footpath, but one bridleway and the footpath ended up unrecorded and one bridleway was recorded as a footpath.
But the county did not look at any of the following
- Inland Revenue records
- Early commercial maps
- early ordnance survey maps
- Deposited plans for railways that were not built or for schemes that were not railways, such as sewers.
- Parish and estate maps
- Sales documents and farm valuations
- Some tithe records.
This means that they did not look at all the information that is now available.
THE SHEER SIZE OF THE TASK
Within about 8 years, East Sussex Council recorded something like 2,000 miles of rights of way. Looking at the records, it is hard not to be impressed by the amount of work put in, both by county council staff and walkers.
But it is clear that in the tight timescale, anything difficult got pushed aside. Perhaps this was in the knowledge that routes could be claimed later.
In the face of any anomaly or objection, the county tended to write to the parish asking them to either provide evidence or to agree to the withdrawal of the route. The parish almost always agreed to the withdrawal, even though they had considered themselves justified in putting the route forward. It is easy to imagine a poorly resourced parish council taking the line of least resistance. As most path researchers know, getting evidence of use is very time consuming, even on the most well used routes.
Something similar can be seen in the way that routes that made it to the draft definitive map were dealt with. The rights of way sub-committee reports reveal long technical analyses of evidence provided by the clerk. Not surprisingly the members always accepted the clerk’s reports!
But it is clear that not every route got the detailed scrutiny that it might objectively deserve. For example, one route in Kingston near Lewes was set out in the Kingston inclosure award. Objectors argued that it could never have been set out because it would have involved cutting through the churchyard wall. This was accepted as a reason for deleting the route. A visit to the churchyard today reveals the route open and in use, and by the side of the churchyard wall. Plainly no visit to the site was made. It is easy to see why, given the volume of work.
CONCLUSION
Different authorities will have worked in different ways, but the example of East Sussex shows how even the most diligent of local authorities could miss or or under-record routes.