Edward
Steer, the son of Edward Steer, a builder and plumber (1820-1872)
and Sarah Rich was born in East Hoathly on 22nd May, 1842. Edward's
father moved to East Grinstead in 1856 where he opened an ironmonger
shop in the High Street (now Broadleys). In 1890 Edward's father built
Moat Congregational Church (now the United Reformed Church).
Edward was taught at Sunday School by Thomas Cramp, the leader of
the East Grinstead Temperance Society.
Eventually Edward and his three brothers, William, George and Walter,
took the pledge and became members of the Band
of Hope.
In 1863 Edward Steer
married Anne Harding, the daughter of Thomas Harding, the owner of
a grocery and drapers store in the High Street. For the next two years
Steer was postmaster in Reigate. In 1865 he moved to Turners Hill
where he was postmaster for seventeen years. Edward Steer remained
a committed Nonconformist and in
1870 became secretary of the Congregational
chapels at Copthorne, Turners Hill and West Hoathly. Steer also formed
the Turners Hill Temperance Society.
Anne Steer gave birth to Alice in 1867. Over the next twenty years
Edward and Annie had five more children: Constance, Charles, Emery,
Florrie and Victor.
The Steer family moved back to East Grinstead in 1882. Later that
year Steer established the Southern Free Press. The following
year Steer began publishing the East
Grinstead Times. Steer used the newspaper to promote
his political and religious ideas. He became active in local politics
and in 1884 failed to be elected to the Local Government Board. The
following year, Steer organised C. J. Heald's unsuccessful attempt
to become Liberal M.P. for East Grinstead.
Steer was a strong supporter of religious and political freedom. In
1887, a member of the Salvation Army
was arrested and sent to prison for preaching sermons in the High
Street. Steer organised a large demonstration against this decision
and helped re-establish the right of citizens to hold public meetings
in the streets of East Grinstead.
Attempts by Edward Steer to be elected to the council failed in 1888
and 1892. However, he was eventually successful
in 1895. Steer was also elected as one one of the Nonconformist
representatives on the East Grinstead School Board. He was also voted
onto the Board of Guardians that had the task of administering the
East Grinstead Workhouse.
Edward Steer sold the Southern Free Press in 1892 but he continued
his interest in journalism and in 1899 wrote a series of articles
for The East Grinstead Observer
on his reminiscences of the town in the 1850s.
Although they described
themselves as 'independents', the majority of men on the East Grinstead
Urban Council were members of the Conservative
Party. Edward Steer usually found himself in a minority when votes
were taken at council meetings, although he did receive support from
Dr. Thomas Hartigan and Joseph
Rice who shared his radical political ideas. In 1900 Steer, Hartigan
and Rice began their campaign to persuade the town to finance the
building of council houses. These men also worked together in the
proposal to buy Mount Noddy and to open it as a park for local children.
At the time, most people in East Grinstead were hostile to the idea
that rates should be used to pay for public parks and to provide cheap
housing.
Edward Steer also became unpopular with ratepayers over his plans
to reform the East Grinstead Workhouse.
Steer's ideas included outdoor relief, an end to workhouse uniforms,
more interesting and fulfilling work for the inmates, and the employment
of trained nurses. Critics such as Charles
Everard argued that Steer's proposed reforms would increase the
cost of running the workhouse.
Steer received considerable support from Thomas
Hartigan, the workhouse doctor. In 1901 Steer and Hartigan launched
a bitter attack on the East Grinstead Board of Guardians. They accused
some members of financial corruption. It was claimed that contracts
were being placed with certain companies in return for cash payments.
Steer and Hartigan could not sufficient evidence to support their
claims and no actions were taken against board members. The Board
of Guardians later forced Dr. Hartigan to resign his post and he left
to become a surgeon at Blackfriars Hospital.
Edward Steer, like most Nonconformists,
believed that the 1902 Education Act
was an infringement of the principles of religious inequality. Steer
saw the act as the State helping the Anglican
Church to indoctrinate Britain's children. East Grinstead formed
a Passive Resistance Movement and several of the leading figures in
the town refused to pay the 'education rate'. Joseph
Rice, G. H. Broadley, Stuart Johnson Reid, Ernest Young, William
Young, Rev. James Campbell, Rev. James Dickerson Davies, Arthur True,
James Morris, John Dalzeil and Alfred Burt
had property seized as a result of their refusual to pay their full
parish-rate. However, this was not possible in the case of Steer,
who had transferred all his property over to his wife. As a result,
in June 1904, Steer was arrested and sent to Lewes Prison.
In 1905 Steer and Joseph Rice were successful
in persuading the East Grinstead Urban Council to purchase Mount Noddy.
Edward Steer had also won the argument over subsidized housing and
by 1905, the first twelve council houses had been built in Bellaggio
Road. However, Steer was still in a minority on the council over the
need for electric street lighting.
Steer's
political belief in equality meant that he was also a supporter of
votes for women. As a leading figure in East Grinstead's Liberal
Party, Steer was a close friend of the Corbett family. Charles
Corbett had campaigned for votes
for women in the House of Commons. Marie Corbett
and her two daughters, Margery Ashby and
Cicely Fisher, were active in the Women's
Suffrage Union. In 1913 Edward Steer joined with Charles Corbett
to help form the East Grinstead Men's League for
Women's Suffrage. In July, 1913, Marie Corbett, asked Edward Steer,
who was now chairman of the East Grinstead Urban Council, to speak
at a meeting before the Women's Great Pilgrimage
to London. The meeting in East Grinstead High Street was broken up
by a hostile crowd of over 1,500 people.
This was not a new experience for Edward Steer, as a member of the
Salvation Army and the Temperance
Society, he had several times been attacked by unruly mobs. Even
meetings held in support of the purchase of Mount Noddy and plans
to subsidize council housing, had resulted in Steer being physically
attacked by his political opponents.
Edward Steer was sixty-nine when war was declared in 1914. Still a
member of the East Grinstead Urban Council, Steer became the town's
Food Controller until the war ended in 1918. Steer served on the council
until he was defeated in 1920.
Steer continued to stand in elections, and
it was only after his third defeat in a row, that he became convinced
he was no longer wanted. Now aged seventy-seven, Steer told the assembled
crowd at the count: "I have served the town for 40 years and
now I am going to retire." Edward
Steer died
on 23rd October, 1925 and was buried at the top of Mount Noddy, a
place overlooking the park that he had fought so long and hard to
obtain for the people of East Grinstead.
Edward and Annie Steer in
East Grinstead in 1888. Children left
to right: Florrie, Alice, Charlie, Victor, Emery and Constance.
(1)
East Grinstead Observer (4th August, 1900)
Edward Steer, Chairman
of the Housing of the Working Class Committee, proposed the building
of cottages upon the vacant land belonging to the council at North
End Pumping Station. Charles Rice said the working class in East Grinstead
were in great need of cottages and he thought that the Council should
do its utmost for the men. East Grinstead was overcrowded and if he
had a hundred cottages he could easily let them.
(2)
East Grinstead Observer (2nd February, 1901)
Mr. Steer
said he hoped this scheme would be carried and he was sure if it was
carried they would earn the gratitude of the town and its succeeding
generations. The scheme would pay for itself in forty years, and after
that time there would be £200 a year coming in reduction of rates.
He thought their grandchildren would thank them for having done that.
The surveyor estimated that at the Bellaggio site it would cost £180
per house; at North End it would cost £150 per house.
(3)
East Grinstead Observer (28th May, 1904)
At Mr. Steer's home, when the seizure of goods was to be made, it
was declared that the whole of the goods were the property of his
wife. Mr. Steer was informed that the alternative to paying the amount
owing in the event of their being no goods would be two days' imprisonment.
Mr. Steer declared his intention of going to prison.
(4)
East Grinstead Observer (6th January, 1900)
Edward Steer
said it was an absolute necessity to have a recreation ground where
men could go after the pressure, which was daily growing more and
more, in their business life. A recreation ground was a necessity
of life. Besides, they had adopted the Town Police Clauses Act by
which they prevented children from playing in the streets, and it
was not logical for them to do that and then provide no place for
the children to play in.
(5)
On 13th August, 1905, Edward Steer spoke at a public meeting on the
need to buy Mount Noddy as a public park. On 19th August, The
East Grinstead Observer published a letter by Thomas Isley on
the meeting.
The reprehensive
tactics of a few persons, apparently organised to deny the speakers
a hearing, were much deplored by those, who, like myself, sought to
hear the facts of the case. However, when something like order prevailed
and Mr. Steer was granted a hearing. It is not given to many speakers
to be able to withstand senseless booing and opposition and then to
convince a very large majority of opponents, but, undoubtedly Mr.
Steer was on Saturday night one of those exceptional men. I never
witnessed a more remarkable instance, had had some of those who did
not trouble to vote held up their hands the resolution would certainly
be carried by a large majority.
(6) On 26th
July 1913, The East Grinstead Observer reported a riot that
had taken place in the town three days previously.
The main streets of East Grinstead were disgraced
by some extraordinary proceedings on Tuesday evening. The non-militant
section of the advocates of securing women’s suffrage had arranged
a march and public meeting on its way to the great demonstration in
London. The "procession" was not an imposing one. It consisted
of about ten ladies who were members of the Suffrage Society. Mrs.
Marie Corbett led the way carrying a silken banner bearing the arms
of East Grinstead. The reception, which the little band of ladies
got, was no means friendly. Yells and hooting greeted them throughout
most of the entire march, and they were the targets for occasional
pieces of turf, especially when they passed through Queen’s Road.
In the High Street they found a crowd of about 1,500 people awaiting
them.
Edward Steer had promised to act as chairman,
and taking his stand against one of the trees on the slope he began
by saying, "Ladies and Gentlemen". This was practically
as far as he got with his speech. Immediately there was an outburst
of yells and laughter and shouting. Laurence Housman, the famous writer,
got no better than Mr. Steer. By this time pieces of turf and a few
ripe tomatoes and highly seasoned eggs were flying about, and were
not always received by the person they were intended for. The unsavoury
odur of eggs was noticeable over a considerable area. Unhappily, Miss
Helen Hoare of Charlwood Farm, was struck in the face with a missile
and received a cut on the cheek and was taken away for treatment.
Some of the women were invited to take shelter
in Mr. Allwork’s house, but as they entered the crowd rushed
the doorway and forced themselves into the house. The police arrived
and the ladies were taken out the back way and escorted them to the
Dorset Arms Hotel, their headquarters, and this was for a long time
besieged by a yelling mob…. Mrs. Marie Corbett slipped away and
took up a position lower down the High Street on the steps of the
drinking fountain. A young clergyman who appealed for fair play was
roughly hustled and lost his hat. Mrs. Corbett had began to speak
from the fountain steps but the crowd moved down the High Street and
broke up her small meeting.
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