by Ian Mortimer
Pity the ironing board won’t be along for another thirty years.
7
Travelling
Long-distance travel is one of the most important aspects of our whole cultural journey from the medieval world to the modern. It underpins our well-being in almost every way – from feeding ourselves in times of want, and warning each other in times of danger, to sharing the benefits of international trade and the spread of scientific and technological ideas. In addition, travel is essential for the justice system and holding political elections. Thus the whole question of getting around is of the utmost importance. Yet you will undoubtedly find travel very frustrating in the late seventeenth century. The state of the roads, suspicion of strangers and the cost of accommodation all present problems. So too do ancient traditions. As Willem Schellinks notes with some exasperation, ‘in the whole of England it is not permitted to travel on the Sabbath by water or on land in any vehicle, or to hire horses, carriages or coaches’.1 There is a 10s fine for travelling on a Sunday unless you have first obtained consent from a magistrate, and, although the law is increasingly flouted, people will ask you to show your permit.
Road Transport
The roads in all parts of Britain leave a lot to be desired. Many of them date back to Roman times, and their surfaces are now so uneven that travellers are forced to take a detour through the surrounding soil, which quickly becomes rutted and muddy. Another problem is the damage caused by the increased number of travellers. For centuries, only pedestrians, cattle, horseriders, packhorses and carts have used the roads and, of those, only pedestrians care if occasionally they have to make their way through a bit of mud. In these days of international trade, however, not only are there more people and animals on the move but there are large numbers of carriages too, as well as many more carts and wagons. These cause a much greater problem: their iron-rimmed tyres create deep ruts in earthen roads, scatter gravel and lever apart the old flagstones where these still form part of the surface.
The roads are in such a state all over Britain. Celia Fiennes is a good guide to their condition: in the south she observes that respectable ladies sometimes have to be taken to church in ox-drawn wagons and that ‘Sussex men and animals have grown long-legged from pulling their feet out of the clay’.2 ‘The roads to Bridport are stony and narrow,’ she declares as she labours through Dorset. Travelling on into Devon, she finds that the large number of ancient enclosed fields ‘makes the ways very narrow, so as in some places a coach and wagons cannot pass’. She observes that Devon people ‘are forced to carry their corn and carriages on horseback with frames of wood like panniers on either side of the horse, so load it high and tie it with cords’.3 Cornwall is similar. There the narrow lanes make for a death trap after heavy rain. One day when Celia is out riding, her horse steps straight into a very deep puddle and she knows she is lucky they both survive the experience.4
Drowning is perhaps something you don’t immediately associate with road transport; nevertheless, it is a real possibility. Ralph Thoresby is caught in a downpour in May 1695 and bides his time at Ware, noting that the rain ‘raised the washes along the road to that height that passengers from London that were upon the road swam, and a poor higgler [pedlar] was drowned, which prevented our travelling for many hours’.5 In 1698 our redoubtable Celia finds the floodwaters in Devon rising and rising until they are up around the windows of her coach; outside she can see cattle swimming in the fields.6 In such conditions the dangers are exacerbated by rickety bridges. Thomas Baskerville’s travels take him across several old wooden bridges in Cambridgeshire, and more than once he crosses in fear of the rotten timbers giving way beneath him.7 In terrible storms, even stone bridges might collapse. In May 1663 two men crossing a river in Northamptonshire are lucky to survive after both the arch in front of them and the one behind are suddenly swept away, leaving them stranded.8
People tend to exaggerate such awkward experiences, and it is worth remembering that, just like the streets of London, there are good examples as well as bad. Good roads generally have stone underpinnings, are raised above the floodplain and are surfaced with gravel. Charles II remarks that there are so many excellent highways in Norfolk that the county should be cut up to provide a few for the rest of the kingdom.9 Generally speaking, however, the roads of England are not fit for purpose. Those in Scotland are even worse. The rough state of the trackways north of the border and the scarcity of the bridges is of no concern to the drovers who guide their cattle and flocks across moors and through fords. In both kingdoms, the only systematic form of maintenance is the requirement that local people fix their own roads. In England and Wales this amounts to parishioners having to provide six days’ labour per year on road maintenance or pay a fine to the Surveyor of Highways. A similar system exists in Scotland, whereby parishioners have to provide three days’ work in summer and three in the autumn.10 But what do you do if, like the twenty or so families who live in Radwell, Hertfordshire, you have two miles of the Great North Road running through your tiny parish? They can’t possibly afford to maintain such a long stretch. If a rich traveller’s coach occasionally breaks an axle or has to be lifted out of a rut in the road, then so be it. There’s probably a sixpence tip in it for them.
Parliament recognises the problem but attends to it with a spectacular lack of urgency. In 1662 an Act is passed requiring every parish to levy a Highway Rate for three years to repair the roads. Not much happens. The following year an Act is passed to allow three turnpikes – barriers lifted on payment of a toll – to be set up to fund the repair of the Great North Road: at Wadesmill in Hertfordshire, Stilton in Huntingdonshire and Caxton in Cambridgeshire. But such is the backlash in Stilton that the barrier is never erected. And as Caxton’s turnpike is easily evaded, only the toll at Wadesmill provides funds for the scheme. Thus Parliament falls back on the old strategy of local coercion. In 1670 it passes a temporary Act putting the obligation on Justices of the Peace to raise a rate to repair routes where parishioners cannot meet the expense themselves. In 1691, another Act gives the Surveyors of Highways the power to call upon JPs to raise rates to buy materials for mending roads.11 These measures are woefully inadequate. Finally, in 1695, with even more coaches on the roads than before, Parliament once again picks up the idea of using tolls to fund maintenance. The second and third Turnpike Acts are passed to fund the Shenfield-to-Harwich road in Essex and the highway between Wymondham and Attleborough in Norfolk. A fourth Act is passed in 1697 for the way between Reigate and Crawley, and a fifth in 1698 for the route from Birdlip to Gloucester.12 The principle that the user pays underlies road-maintenance strategy from now on.
FINDING YOUR WAY
Signposts are one of the most useful contributions to civilisation but they are few and far between prior to the 1690s.13 One erected in 1669 at Chipping Campden shows the ways to the neighbouring county towns of Gloucester, Oxford, Worcester and Warwick, with the miles to each place marked in Roman numerals on each hand. But you will have to walk a long way in any of those directions to find the next sign. The great step forward comes in 1697, when an Act of Parliament orders Surveyors of the Highways throughout England and Wales to erect a ‘direction stone or post’ at every crossroads in their parish.14 The following year, as Celia Fiennes makes her way through Lancashire, she remarks approvingly that ‘at all crossways there are posts with hands pointing to each road with the names of the great town or market towns that it leads to’.15 Not every county is so quick to erect them. Many parishes in rural Devon won’t get round to setting up direction stones for at least another fifteen years.16
So, how do you find your way around if there is no signpost? You could try asking for directions. However, in some rural places, locals won’t be able to direct you to places more than three miles away.17 In more remote areas it is advisable to hire a guide: he will not only lead you to your destination, but will also warn you of areas where you might be particularly vulnerable to flooding or highwaymen. The o
ther option is to buy a road atlas. Fortunately the first such publication, John Ogilby’s Britannia, appears in 1675. This depicts 2,519 miles of roads in 100 strip maps: a pioneering form of cartography that will become very popular over the next century or so. His method of compilation is remarkably thorough. He uses his ‘waywiser’ or measuring wheel to record the actual lengths of the roads, and he standardises his measurements not on the various local miles in use but on the statute mile of 1,760 yards. He claims to have surveyed 23,000 miles of roads in all, making his survey the most significant advance on domestic cartography for more than a hundred years.
The whole question of navigation becomes much more complicated after the sun has gone down. In champaign country, even if you have the benefit of moonlight or a lantern, you may well find yourself walking across a road one minute and through an open field the next. In East Anglia, where the fens are being drained by the building of deep ditches on either side of the road, there is a serious risk of accidentally ending up in the dark water on a moonless night. Wide expanses of waste ground and commons are also a cause for concern. In December 1682 Thomas Baskerville and six companions go off the beaten track in Gloucestershire. They ride into fog, miss a turning and carry on for four or five miles. ‘We found ourselves shut up in darkness upon these comfortless downs where I knew we might ride ten miles forwards and perhaps not find a house,’ writes Baskerville. Eventually the company meet a man who directs them to the nearest inn, where they find good fires, excellent ale and food and beds for the night.18
Travelling across London after dark is somewhat easier, especially after 1662. In that year an Act of Parliament requires the main streets to be lit until 9 p.m. by lanterns fixed above the doors of houses at regular intervals. In 1683 Anthony Vernatty obtains a patent to light the streets and installs new lamps with thick convex glass coverings, which magnify the light for the benefit of pedestrians.19 Note, however, that although these burn until midnight, they are only lit from Michaelmas to Lady Day (29 September to 25 March), and then only from the third day after the Full Moon to the sixth day after the New Moon. They are also expensive to maintain, so many streets and alleys are left in the dark.20 Most other towns do not follow London’s example, on account of the expense. In those places you will need to use your own lantern. The best sort has special glass, like the aforementioned lamps, which magnifies the light and carries it further. If you don’t have a lantern and there is no moon and the street lamps are out, then you’ll have to hire one of the ‘links’ – the torches carried by boys who, for a penny or two, will offer to guide you home. Be careful, though, for unless you know the city well, you cannot be sure exactly where the boy will lead you – perhaps into some dark alley where he will extinguish his lantern suddenly and leave you to the mercy of his friends.
COACHES
A hundred years ago it was not seemly for men to take a coach. It was a form of transport for ladies; gentlemen rode alongside or behind on horseback. Nowadays men take coaches and carriages without a second thought. When Pepys says he is ‘almost ashamed to be seen in a hackney’ it is not because it reflects badly on his manliness but because it is such a common thing to do: he would prefer a coach of his own.21 But with many Londoners thinking likewise – there are about 9,000 coaches on the streets of the capital in the 1660s – you can just imagine the effect on the traffic.22 Travellers are constantly cursing about being caught in a ‘stop’, as too many coaches and carts block a narrow street. When a coach driver carelessly knocks an item off a market stall and has to pause to make amends, or a drayman and a coachman exchange angry words due to some reckless driving, and one descends from his vehicle and grabs the reins of the other and starts threatening him, the traffic yet again grinds to a halt.23
There are many varieties of passenger vehicle on the roads. The slowest and most uncomfortable are the stage wagons or caravans, which carry people and merchandise from town to town. With four large wheels and a cloth awning, and drawn by a long line of horses in a row, they can accommodate up to twenty people.24 The driver normally walks along beside the horses, cracking his whip, which gives you an idea as to how slow they are. Travelling this way will make you think you are about to head out for the American West. But they have their place, moving the less well off and their possessions from town to town. They are also a very safe way to travel, as highwaymen tend not to bother holding up large numbers of poor people. There are about 300 carriers operating between provincial towns and London in 1681.25
Private coaches are a much faster mode of transport. At the start of the period, these are mainly square cabs with large wheels at the rear and smaller ones at the front. The cab itself is normally a leather-covered wooden frame suspended from the chassis; this leads to a fair bit of swinging about, and you may feel a little seasick. From the 1660s new designs proliferate. The cab of the average coach is given a more distinct taper, so that it is wider at the top than it is at the bottom. The best examples are given spring suspension. Windows, which were previously covered with leather blinds to keep out the weather, are increasingly glazed.26 Vehicles with seating for six passengers, pulled by four or six horses (hence ‘a coach and four’ or ‘a coach and six’), are built to carry gentlemen from their country seats into town. Some of these are gilt but, after Charles II expresses his dissatisfaction with ostentatious coaches, most are simply painted black and decorated only with the owner’s coat of arms on the door.
In London you’ll see a large number of small four-wheeled carriages with a yellow cab and red wheels drawn by two horses. These are hackney carriages, so called because hacquenee is an old French word for horse. You’ll also see quite a few open-top chariots, driven by the occupants themselves. Some of these have bodies of wickerwork, for extra speed. The general trend is to design faster, lighter coaches for the city. In 1665 Robert Hooke produces a prototype for a speedy two-wheeled, two-passenger chariot drawn by a single horse. Then there are calashes – small chariot-coaches with collapsible tops – a sort of early convertible. Right at the end of our period the chaise makes its appearance: a light, open-top fast vehicle drawn by one or two horses.27 You can see where all this is heading … Samuel Pepys has a lot of fun in Sir William Pen’s chariot, which is drawn by two horses, competing against Sir William Batten’s coach and four. The chariot wins – although the occupants’ clothes, including Pepys’s velvet coat, are covered in dust and grime as a result.28
Okay, practicalities. If you are in London and you need a cab, you can hail a hackney carriage. They are not meant to loiter in the street, as the result of a 1660 Act to stop them blocking thoroughfares, but you will still find them waiting wherever there is a convenient spot. Lorenzo Magalotti notices them on almost every street in 1669. Alternatively, there is a cab rank at the Maypole in the Strand. Each vehicle for hire can carry up to four passengers anywhere in the city or the suburbs. The number of cabs is limited to 400, so you will find it hard to obtain one at times of great demand, such as in bad weather or after the theatre. Before 1670, most do not have glass windows, so you will travel in the dark. From 1662 drivers are all supposed to be licensed (at a one-off fee of £5) and the cab should display the driver’s licence number on the outside. The standard charge is 12d per hour. According to Monsieur Misson, the normal way of settling a dispute about a fare is by fighting your coachman. Even the duke of Grafton – the king’s illegitimate son – has been known to fight a hackney-carriage driver over the cost of a journey.29
If you plan on heading further afield, you will need to obtain a coach of your own. At the bottom end of the market, professional men tend to buy vehicles in the £15–25 range. If you are prepared to buy second-hand, you can obtain them even more cheaply. One belonging to the Lincoln physician Dr Henry Corbet is valued at £13 10s with all its harness in 1680.30 Alternatively, you can get yourself a little open-top chariot for running around town: the historian Sir William Dugdale buys a new one in 1681 for £23 13s, plus £4 for the harness and £1 fo
r a cover for it when not in use.31 Sir William Penn’s speedy chariot costs £32. A good-quality covered glass coach will set you back considerably more. Samuel Pepys agrees to pay £53 for one in 1668. At the top end of the spectrum, the earl of Bedford’s new coach in May 1682 comes to £127 4s.32 Add a team of suitable horses (at £25 each) and suitable livery for the ducal coachman and a couple of footmen – and the earl won’t have any change from £300.33 Then there are the running costs. Dr Henry Corbet has four horses, worth an average of £7 each, and needs to rent at least four acres to keep them all in grass, at approximately 10s per acre, plus hay in winter.34 Don’t forget the veterinary bills, farriers’ bills and the maintenance of the coach itself. At the expensive end of the scale, just feeding the earl of Bedford’s six horses when he is staying in London costs about £1 10s per week. And, really, an earl should not have to make do with just the one coach; he ought to have several. The earl of Bedford never spends less than £1,000 per year on his stables and coaches, and in some years more than £1,500.35
The principal advantage of the coach and six over the coach and four is not that the extra two horses make you go that much faster – horses can only canter so quickly – but that you can travel at high speed for longer. In 1667 Pepys travels 18 miles to Epsom in a coach and four, which, at 6mph, is not bad going, but the same horses take an extra hour to make the return journey.36 John Evelyn, travelling to Althorpe in 1688, covers the first 32 miles in a coach and four at a similar 5–6mph but then, after lunch, is given the use of a coach and six for the remaining 40 miles and does an impressive 8mph all the way.37 The other factor to bear in mind about a coach and six is the prestige value. Wherever these vehicles go, they turn heads. You definitely want to be seen in one, even if you don’t need to travel fast. Pepys is delighted when he receives a letter from Lord Howe telling him that his lordship is sending his coach and six to collect him the following morning.38 Many ladies and gentlemen who cannot attend a funeral send their coaches to represent them, with their coat of arms displayed on the sides of the cab. Evelyn proudly notes in his diary that no fewer than six coach and sixes attend the funeral of his daughter Mary in 1685.39
