[Gill, Eric] Pepler, Douglas [that was Harry Douglas Cark (called ‘Hilary’) Pepler].

The Devil’s Devices or Control versus Service. With Woodcuts by Eric Gill.

First Edition. London – Hammersmith, Published at The Hampshire House Workshops, 1915. Octavo. Frontispiece, 125 pages with woodcuts throughout the publication. Hardcover / Original publisher’s illustrated Hardcover in protective Mylar. Very good condition with only minor signs of wear.

Hilary Pepler, also known as Douglas Pepler, was born at Eastbourne to a Quaker family and educated at Bootham School. After school, he tried several occupations including land surveying, the tea trade and engineering. In the early 1900s, Pepler moved to Hammersmith, London with his wife Clare Whiteman, and obtained employment with London City Council in the department of child-care. He developed an interest in social theory and how to improve the lives of working people in the face of industrialisation, writing several tracts on the subject. On a practical level, he was instrumental in the introduction of free school meals; by any standards, a very considerable achievement. His experience of Social Work however, left him skeptical as to the ultimate value of such initiatives and most inclined to support self-help as a better means of eradicating poverty.

Hammersmith at the time was something of an Arts and Crafts enclave and Pepler became deeply involved in the movement and the socialist politics of Fabianism. He soon became friends with Edward Johnston, later meeting Eric Gill. These three formed a close bond, spending many hours debating social and artistic issues.
Pepler with Susan and Stephen (1916).

Notwithstanding Gill’s move to Ditchling in 1907, Pepler continued to develop his ideas and maintained contact. One major initiative that he was involved in was founding the Hampshire House Club in 1907, a working men’s club in Hammersmith with a strong political and didactic agenda. When war broke out, the organisation was used as a basis to organise workshop facilities for refugee Belgian craftsmen in a structure not unlike what the Guild was to become. Indeed, lessons learnt from this experience were to inform the way the Guild was set up.

Another major project for Pepler was writing The Devil’s Devices which was published in 1915 by Hampshire House itself. It is a satire, not just opposing capitalism and industrialisation, but also Trade Unionism, Government and even general education which he sees as an unnecessary distraction in the lives of the working classes. He gives support to the Distributist ideas of small workshops, owned by the workers, as the preferable mode of economic entity but goes beyond most thinkers by declaring everything else being the work of the devil. What he seems to be proposing borders on a benign form of anarchy with no central provision, and his views have obviously moved a long way beyond what could be appropriate for an official with LCC. It is of little surprise that he was by now looking for different employment. (Source: The Guild of St.Joseph and St. Dominic)

• Language: English
• Inventory Number: 31856AB

EUR 475,--