Part 5

“Take care that your wheels be good; and get a new set bought as often as you can whether you are allowed the old as your perquisite or not; in one case it will turn to your honest profit and on the other it will be a just punishment on your master’s covetousness, and probably the coach-maker will consider you too.”

ROADS IN THE 18TH CENTURY.

Every author of the time has something to say about the roads. Daniel Bourn[17] says:—

“So late as thirty or forty years ago [_i.e._, 1723-33] the roads of England were in a most deplorable condition. Those that were narrow were narrow indeed, often to that degree that the stocks of the wheels bore hard against the bank on each side, and in many places they were worn below the level of the neighbouring surface, many feet, nay, yards perpendicular; and a wide-spreading, brushy hedge intermixed with old half-decayed trees and stubbs hanging over the traveller’s head intercepting the benign influence of the heavens from his path, and the beauties of the circumjacent country from his view, made it look more like the retreat of wild beasts and reptiles than the footsteps of man. In other parts where the road was wide, it might be, and often was too much so, and exhibited a scene of a different aspect. Here the wheel-carriage had worn a diversity of tracks which wore either deep, or rough and stony, or high or low as Mother Nature had placed the materials upon the face of the ground; the space between these were frequently furzy hillocks of thorny brakes, through or among which the equestrian traveller picked out his entangled and uncouth steps.

“To these horrible, stony, deep, miry, uncomfortable, dreary roads the narrow-wheel waggon seems to be best adapted, and these were frequently drawn by seven, eight, or even ten horses, that with great difficulty and hazard dragged after them twenty-five or thirty hundredweight, seldom more.”

[17] _Treatise of Wheeled Carriages_, London, 1763.

Bourn’s reference to the “narrow-wheel waggon” touches a matter which formed the subject of hot debate for generations. It was urged that the narrow wheels of waggons were largely the means of cutting up the roads, and no doubt these did contribute to the general condition of rut and ridge that characterised them. This view was adopted by Parliament, and to encourage the use of wide wheels a system of turnpike tolls was adopted which treated the wide tire far more leniently than the narrow; anything under 9 inches in width being considered narrow.

Bourn was a warm advocate for wide wheels, and the book from which the above passage is taken describes an improved waggon invented by himself; the drawing is from the inventor’s work. The wheels of this vehicle resemble small garden rollers; they are 2 feet high and 16 inches wide. Each is attached independently to the body of the waggon and the fore wheels being placed side by side in the centre, while the hind wheels are set wide apart, the waggon is practically designed to fulfil the functions of a road-roller.[18] It does not appear that Bourn’s invention obtained any general acceptance, which is perhaps not very surprising.

[18] In the _St. James’s Chronicle_ of December 30, 1772, a correspondent “observes with particular pleasure the good effects of the rolling machine on the turnpike road to Stony Stratford. For this important improvement Mr. Sharp is responsible.” The writer proceeds to describe with the exactness and appreciation due to so useful an invention, the first patent of the familiar road-roller.

SPEED OF THE 18TH CENTURY STAGE COACH.

In 1742, the Oxford coach, leaving London at seven in the morning, reached High Wycombe (about forty miles) at five in the evening, remained there the night, and concluded the journey on the following day. The Birmingham coach made its journey at about the same pace, forty miles per day, resting half a day at Oxford. Night travel does not seem to have been at all usual. Apart from the badness of the roads, the audacity of highwaymen was a sufficient reason for refraining from journeys by night.

Some improvements were made in private carriages at this period, but there was little change for the better in the stage coaches, which differed slightly from the “machine” of a century earlier; the driver’s seat was safer and less uncomfortable, and that was the only noteworthy alteration. An advertisement of 1750 announces “accommodation behind the coach for baggage and passengers; fares 21s., and servants 10s. 6d., riding either in the basket behind or on the box beside the driver.”

Endeavour to expedite the service between the great towns of the kingdom is shown in an advertisement of the “Flying Coach,” which was put on the London and Manchester road in 1754. This informs possible patrons that “incredible as it may appear, this coach will actually arrive in London in four days and a half after leaving Manchester.” The distance between the two cities is about 187 miles, making the rate of speed a little over 44 miles per day.

The stage coach of 1755 is thus described by Mr. Thrupp.

“They were covered with dull black leather, studded by way of ornament with broad-headed nails, with oval windows in the quarters, the frames painted red. On the panels were displayed in large characters the names of the places where the coach started and whither it went. The roof rose in a high curve with an iron rail around it. The coachman and guard sat in front upon a high narrow boot, often garnished with a spreading hammer-cloth with a deep fringe. Behind was an immense basket supported by iron bars in which passengers were carried at lower fares. The whole coach was usually drawn by three horses, on the first of which a postillion rode, in a cocked hat and a long green-and-gold coat. The machine groaned and creaked as it went along with every tug the horses gave it, and the speed was frequently but four miles an hour.”

Three horses may have done the work in summer, but there is no reason to suppose that the roads of 1755 were any better than they had been sixteen years earlier, when Thomas Pennant thus described a journey in March from Chester to London. The stage, he says:—

“was then no despicable vehicle for country gentlemen. The first day, with much labour, we got from Chester to Whitchurch, twenty miles; the second day to the Welsh Harp; the third to Coventry; the fourth to Northampton; the fifth to Dunstable; and as a wondrous effort on the last, to London, before the commencement of night. The strain and labour of six good horses, sometimes eight, drew us through the sloughs of Mireden and many other places.”

THE APPLICATION OF SPRINGS.

In the year 1768 Dr. R. Lovell Edgeworth, who had devoted much attention to the subject, and had made numerous experiments,[19] succeeded in demonstrating that springs were as advantageous to the horses of, as to the passengers in a coach; and he constructed a carriage for which the Society of English Arts and Manufactures awarded him three gold medals. In this conveyance the axletrees were divided and the motion of each wheel was relieved by a spring. Just one dozen patents for springs were granted during the eighteenth century, and it is impossible to say which invention had most influence on methods of building coaches. In 1772 a patent was granted to James Butler for a new coach-wheel the spokes of which were constructed of springs; but this curious contrivance is mentioned nowhere—so far as the writer’s investigations have shown—but in the Patent Office files, whence we may conclude it was a failure.

[19] _An Essay on the Construction of Roads and Carriages._ London, 1817.

The adoption of springs was certainly gradual. It is probably right to assume that wealthy men led the way by having coaches built on springs or altering their vehicles. It is impossible to draw a hard and fast line between the period of the coach without and the coach with springs. The illustrations show that travelling carriages on springs and braces were built in 1750. These drawings prove that, clumsy though the public conveyances were, private carriages were both tolerably light and comfortable. The “whip springs” to which the braces are attached were in general use ten years later.

A curious error arose from the application of springs to public conveyances, according to Dr. Lovell Edgeworth. Their introduction, it must be premised, led to the accommodation of passengers and loading of baggage on top of the stage coach, and coachmen, finding the vehicle drew more easily, attributed the fact, not to the springs, but to the increased height and reduced length of the load.[20]

[20] Abolition of the basket on the hind axle would have materially reduced the length of the load.

In the belief that a high and short load possessed some mysterious property which made it easier to draw than a low long one, builders vied with each other in building lofty vehicles. “Hence in all probability,” says the authority we are quoting, “arose the preposterous elevation of public carriages.”

OUTSIDE PASSENGERS.

Dr. Lovell Edgeworth gives us to understand that the practice of carrying passengers on the roof of the coach followed the application of springs to stage coaches; and in view of the belief noticed above this seems exceedingly probable. The practice had clearly been in vogue for some years when the _Annual Register_ published the following paragraph:—

“_September 7 (1770)._—It were greatly to be wished the stage coaches were put under some regulations as to the numbers of persons and quantity of baggage. Thirty-four persons were in and about the Hertford coach this day when it broke down by one of the braces giving way.”

In 1775, we learn from the same publication, stage coaches generally carried eight persons inside and often ten outside passengers. On another page appears the statement that “there are now of these vehicles [stage coaches], flies, machines and diligences upwards of 400, and of other wheeled carriages 17,000.”

In 1785 was passed George III.’s Act, which forbade the conveyance of more than six persons on the roof of any coach and more than two on the box. This Act was superseded in 1790 by another which permitted only one person to travel on the box and only four on the roof of any coach drawn by three or more horses. A coach drawn by less than three horses might carry one passenger on the box and three on the roof, but such vehicles might not ply more than twenty-five miles from the London Post Office.

The first “long coaches” (_i.e._ long-stage vehicles) and those called diligences were superseded by what were called the “old heavies,” carrying six inside passengers and twelve out.[21]

[21] _The Public Carriages of Great Britain._ J. E. Bradfield, London, 1855.

ROADS IN GEORGE III’s TIME.

The turnpike road had been improved by the year 1773, when Mr. Daniel Bourn wrote a pamphlet[22] answering some objections which had been urged against his waggon on rollers (see p. 79). Mr. Jacob had asserted that the roughness of the roads was an insuperable obstacle to the enormously wide wheels invented by Mr. Bourn; and the latter, while admitting the wretched condition of local roads, refutes this argument as applied to the great roads:—

“A person might follow a waggon from London to York and meet with very few great stones ... let us now view this more agreeable turnpike road, yet even here you will find that there is less degrees of loose dirt and mangled materials.”

[22] _Some Brief Remarks upon Mr. Jacob’s Treatise._ London, 1773.

In this connection it will be remembered that the road roller had been brought into use in the previous year (see footnote p. 80).

The improvement was by no means universal, however. Arthur Young[23] writes:—

“I know not in the whole range of language terms sufficiently expressive to describe this infernal road. To look over a map, and perceive that it is a principal one, not only to some towns, but even whole counties, one would naturally conclude it to be at least decent; but let me most seriously caution all travellers who may accidentally purpose to travel this terrible country, to avoid it as they would the devil, for a thousand to one but they break their necks or their limbs by overthrows or breakings down. They will here meet with ruts, which I actually measured, four feet deep, and floating with mud, only from a wet summer; what, therefore, must it be after the winter? The only mending it receives, in places, is the tumbling in loose stones, which serve no other purpose but jolting the carriage in a most intolerable manner. These are not merely opinions, but facts, for I actually passed three carts broken down in these eighteen miles of execrable memory.”

[23] _Tour in the North of England._ London, 1770.

IMPROVEMENTS IN STAGE COACHES.

The last twenty-five years of the eighteenth century saw great increase of the coaching industry and many important improvements. The “long stages” were still slow; the _Edinburgh Courant_, of 1779, contains an advertisement of the London Coach which “will run every Tuesday, occupying ten days, resting all Sunday at Barrowbridge; for the better accommodation of passengers will be altered to a new genteel two-end coach machine hung upon steel springs, exceeding light and easy.” At this period the newspapers often contained advertisements inviting a companion to share with the advertiser the risks and expenses of posting to London.

It was no doubt the love of Englishmen for privacy which led a Mr. Crispus Claggett to patent in 1780 his “Imperial Mercury.” This vehicle had the outward appearance of one carriage, but it was divided into four equal compartments with space in each for four persons. Each compartment was entered by its own door and was partitioned off from the others by doors and glasses, This curious conveyance must have somewhat resembled an early railway coach.

THE MAIL COACH.

Mr. John Palmer’s[24] “diligences” were put upon the road in 1783, and with these the proprietor laid the first crude foundation of the mail service. The ordinary post was carried by boys on horseback and was both slow and uncertain owing to the poor quality of the horses, the badness of the roads and not least to the untrustworthiness of the boys. Every letter for which expedition was necessary was now sent by diligences where they were established, and they ran from nearly all the towns in the kingdom to London and between many of the principal towns. Postage by these was very expensive: a letter by the ordinary post from Bath to London cost fourpence, whereas it cost two shillings for “booking, carriage and porterage” if sent by diligence. The greater speed and safety were the inducements to use the diligence for important letters, as on the stage coaches both guard and coachman were well armed; the former sat on the box with the driver, and, says a writer of the time, “always sat with his carbine cocked on his knees.”

[24] The story of John Palmer’s work in connection with the postal service, may be read in Joyce’s _History of the Post Office_ (1893), and in many histories and other works dealing with Bath. Palmer became Member of Parliament for Bath in 1801.

The conveyance of letters by diligence or “coach diligence” from Bath, where Mr. Palmer resided, to London was an experiment on the success of which that gentleman depended largely in his battle with the officials of Parliament and Parliamentary Committees when he sought to bring about change in the method of carrying letters. For a considerable time those in authority refused to admit the possibility of a coach travelling from Bath to London, 108 miles, in eighteen hours; but after a hard struggle Mr. Palmer triumphed, and the first mail coach ran from Bristol to London on August 2, 1784. Six miles an hour had been promised, but the journey, 117 miles, was performed in seventeen hours, or at a rate of nearly seven miles an hour, about double the speed of the mounted post-boy.

These early mail coaches (the “old heavies”) were cumbrous vehicles, and by no means remarkable for strength of construction: indeed, until Mr. Palmer took the matter firmly in hand and compelled the contractors to replace their worn-out coaches by new ones (which were built by Besant), three or four breakdowns or upsets were daily reported to the Post-master General. They were drawn by four horses; carried six inside passengers and, until the law of 1785 already noticed, twelve “outsides.” Their speed on the principal roads was gradually accelerated about this time, and after the mail coaches began to work the pace of “fly stage coaches,” or flying coaches, was increased to eight miles an hour.

On some roads the old slow coaches remained; as late as the year 1798 the Telegraph left Gosport at one o’clock in the morning and reached Charing Cross at eight in the evening, thus occupying nineteen hours over a journey of 80 miles; a speed of little over four miles an hour.

In 1792 sixteen mail coaches left London daily; and seven years later these had increased to about eighty.

REGULATIONS FOR MAIL AND STAGE COACHES.

During George III’s reign, three Acts of Parliament had been passed defining the number of outside passengers that any stage coach might carry, and making other regulations in the public interest; these three Acts were repealed by a fourth placed on the statute book in 1810, which enacted that any “coach, berlin, landau, chariot, diligence, calash, chaise-marine or other four-wheeled vehicle,” employed as a public carriage and drawn by four horses might carry ten outside passengers including the guard but not the coachman; that only one person might share the box with the coachman; and of the remaining nine, three should sit in front and six behind. No passenger might sit on the baggage. Stages drawn by two or three horses might carry not more than five outside passengers; “long coaches” or “double-bodied coaches” might carry eight.

The social distinction between “inside” and the “outside” is betrayed by a clause of this law which forbade any outside passenger to travel inside unless with the consent of one inside passenger; and the “inside” who gave consent was to have the “outside” placed next him.

This Act also prescribed important limitations to the height of coaches: neither passenger nor luggage might be carried on the roof of any coach the top of which was over 8 feet 9 inches from the ground and whose width was under 4 feet 6 inches measured from the centre of one wheel track to the centre of the other. On a four-horse coach 8 feet 9 inches high the baggage might be piled to a height of two feet; on one drawn by two or three horses, to a height of eighteen inches. As it was considered expedient to encourage low-hung coaches with the view of attaining greater immunity from accidents, it was legal to pile baggage up to a height of 10 feet 9 inches from the ground. Any passenger might require any turnpike keeper to count the “outsides” or to measure the height of the luggage on the roof. At a later date the fast mail coaches were prohibited by the Post-master General from carrying any baggage at all on the roof.

MAIL COACH PARADE ON THE KING’S BIRTHDAY.

Mr. Thrupp gives the following description of the mail coaches as they appeared at the “King’s Birthday Parade,” an interesting display which appears to have been held for the first time in the year 1799, and which remained an annual function until 1835. The coaches assembled in Lincoln’s Inn Fields, and drove through the streets past St. James’ Palace and back to the General Post Office, then in Lombard Street:—

“Each coach was new or turned out to look like new and was painted red with the Royal Arms on the door panel, and on the smaller panel above the name of the town to which the coach went; on the boot the number of the mail, and on each upper quarter one of the stars of the four Orders of the Knighthood of the United Kingdom, the Garter, the Bath, the Thistle and St. Patrick. The coaches were built just big enough to contain four inside and three or four outside, and coachman and guard. The body was hung upon a perch carriage and eight telegraph springs, the underworks being both solid and simple in construction.”

A writer in _Baily’s Magazine_ (June, 1900), gives a description of this parade; only the coachmen and guards, in new uniforms, were allowed on the coaches, for which gentlemen used to lend their best teams; the procession generally consisted of about twenty-five coaches and was prolonged by the presence of a horseman between every two coaches.

THE MAIL COACHMAN AND GUARD.

The mail coaches in their daily routine assembled in Lombard Street between 8 and 8.20 p.m. every evening to receive the mails, and drew up in double file. Each was known by the name of the town to which it ran, and on the call of “Manchester,” “Liverpool,” or “Chester,” the coach bound thither broke rank and came up to the post-office door to receive the mails; the bags were tossed into the boot and the slamming of the lid of the boot was the signal to start.

Most of the mails for the Western counties started at 7 p.m. from the Gloucester Coffee House in Piccadilly, the mail bags being brought thither from the General Post Office in gigs drawn by fast-trotting horses, The stages for the West started from Hatchett’s; for the North, from the Peacock, Islington.

The mail guard was a considerable personage; when the modern style of build was adopted, the hind seat over the mail boot was strictly reserved to him, nobody being allowed to share it, as a precaution against robbery of the mails. To obtain an appointment as guard on a mail coach the applicant had to produce a recommendation from a Member of Parliament showing that he bore a high character, and a medical certificate to effect that he was of good constitution (exceedingly necessary in view of the nature of his work); if accepted as a probationer he had to spend a term in a coach factory and there learn how to repair a broken pole and patch up any other fracture that might occur on the road. His pay was only 10s. per week, but his perquisites were considerable; he might make as much as £3 or £4 a week, by taking charge of plate chests and valuables entrusted to his care; and it was the custom to allow the guard and coachman to divide all fares of 3s. or less between them.

The guard went the whole way with his coach; the coachman’s “stage” was generally forty or fifty miles out and home again. The latter’s wages were supplemented by tips from the passengers, who were admonished that the time had come to open their purses by the coachman’s polite “Gentlemen, I leave you here.”

The money thus collected by the driver of a first-class coach amounted, it is said, to £200 or £300 a year. The coachman was subject to numerous regulations which aimed at the security of passengers and mails. He might not allow anyone else to drive, without the consent of the coach proprietor or against the wishes of the other passengers; he might not leave his box unless a man was at the leaders’ heads; and there were many such minor instructions to be observed.