The Village

Episode 1

Episode #2.1

58 mins

1923: The Middletons are just about surviving with their dairy farm whilst Martha has married George. Lady Clem is reluctantly hosting arrogant, promiscuous Lord Kilmartin, who can assist Edmund's political progress towards being Home Secretary. Bert volunteers to be the hare in the annual hare and hounds race organized by the Allinghams with a £5 cash prize if he avoids capture. His plan to help him move to Sheffield for a job involves changing clothes with Gerard Eyre to put the hounds off the scent and, whilst he wins, Kilmartin accuses him of cheating and withholds payment. Socialist Bill Gibby arrives in the village to make a speech, quoting from Shelley's poem "The Masque of Anarchy." The Allinghams host a boxing tournament with a financial prize given to anybody who can survive a round with Ghana Jones, a black boxer who is barred as a boxing professional serving in the Great War. Bert enters and loses though Kilmartin wins, through bribery. However, backed by Martha, Grace shames Edmund into paying Bert his cash reward, losing Kilmartin's support. While Edmund's agent Bairstow blackmails Kilmartin into giving Edmund a cabinet post. Bert decides to give the money to his father to pay rental for a cattle barn.