Arthur Polley and sons, thought to be harvesting around 1910 and working for Fairhead of Peldon. The living wagon has W.G. Fairhead Peldon on the side. Arthur Polley and family lived at Ardleigh and worked the traction engines for some time - Arthur is the great great grandfather of Helen Jones who sent the photograph.

William Golden Fairhead at Brick House Farm, Peldon had an agricultural contracting business. Cecil Baldwin worked for Fairhead and his nephew Tony tells us that Cecil worked for him from a young age driving steam engines. They would travel widely - Harwich for example, with a live-in van for the week, and taking their cycles to get home at the weekend. As a boy, he would have to be first up in the morning, to raise steam.

The engines in the photograph are Ploughing Engines.

John Fowler manufactured 14hp, single-cylinder, steam ploughing engines - numbers 3051 & 3052 together with Living Van - possibly in the process of cultivating the land? The engines were new in 1876 and purchased second-hand by William G. Fairhead in July 1904. It looks like the wagon in the centre is full of timber to fuel the engines which would also have required water to be delivered regularly during the working.
[From the Archivist - Steam Plough Club]

Date: c1910