In case tour drivers think they have a hard life today, Alan Payling looks back to consider what life was like for coach drivers in the 17th century at the dawn of the era of stagecoaches
There are many that will have enjoyed a six to eight day trip from London to Devon. Leaving the smoke behind and heading west is always a pleasure. The route hasn’t changed that much in quite a long time and the speed of travel is somewhat similar. I say ‘similar’ with my tongue very much in my cheek. While modern coaches on busy bank holiday weekends can hit average speeds of 30mph, in the late 17th century coaches were rattling along on the London to Exeter route at an impressive 30mpd. Yes, that’s right, 30mpd was a good speed in Restoration England – 30 miles per day. This meant that while the modern coach can cover the route in a quarter of a day, tour round Devon and then get home, all in a week, stagecoaches – real stagecoaches – would only manage a one way trip in that time. Everyone would have thought that in comparison to earlier times that was quick, very quick, almost a wonder of the age.
A tough job
So what was life like for the coach driver in the second half of the 17th century? In a word, it was a rough, tough, unpleasant, sometimes dangerous life for some very rough, tough and occasionally, dangerous people.
The obvious difference is that the stagecoach driver, or coachman, would always be exposed to the weather and there was a lot of that heading straight at him, fully exposed as he was to the wind, rain, hail and snow. If you wanted some heat, you had to rely on the sun, but the air-conditioning of the day was more likely to be turned right down to below freezing. This was the period of England’s little Ice Age, the time when it was so cold, Londoners held the famous ice fairs on the Thames when the river was frozen solid from January 2 to February 20 1684. What was known as the Long Frost ran from December 1683 through to February 1684. It is reported that even the sea froze for a mile off Kent. It was a cold job driving a stagecoach.[wlm_nonmember][…]
By subscribing you will benefit from:
- Operator & Supplier Profiles
- Face-to-Face Interviews
- Lastest News
- Test Drives and Reviews
- Legal Updates
- Route Focus
- Industry Insider Opinions
- Passenger Perspective
- Vehicle Launches
- and much more!
One of the big dangers for the coachman, heading out of London on the King’s highway was the threat of robbery – this was the age of the highwayman. Today’s coach driver occasionally has the hassle of someone nicking their briefcase or their jacket that they all too often leave in full view. Occasionally, when they’re parked up overnight, if they leave their sat nav in situ, someone will smash the peage window causing unwelcome delays and costs when it happens in the wrong place. To my knowledge, when they’re passing Heston services on the M4, today’s coach drivers won’t have a scooter pull alongside with the rear passenger pointing a gun at them saying something along the lines of: “You got to stand and deliver, like. Your money or your life – bro, innit!”
Life is a bit safer now for coach drivers, it must be said. But for the coachman, highway robbery was a regular occurrence. A robbery could happen in the narrow streets of London, not just out on the open road. One member of a gang would stop the coach while his colleagues opened the doors of the coach, and at gunpoint, grabbed what they could from the terrified passengers making their escape into the adjacent labyrinth of streets. Of course, the classic scenario was for the stagecoach to be waylaid at gunpoint at an isolated spot while the romantic figure of the aristocratic gentleman turned highwayman, deprived the passengers and the driver of their valuables – politely, of course. What coachmen could actually face though would be a gang of up to 16 highwaymen who robbed the Worcester stagecoach in December 1691 of £2,500 worth of the king’s money. In 1692, seven highwaymen robbed the Manchester stagecoach of £15,000 worth of valuables belonging to the king. He was not amused. This was when a sailor earned £30 a year, all found. The reality, of course, was that this was nothing less than armed robbery, and a terrifying experience it must have been.
However if caught, the highwayman provided citizens of 17th century London with a very popular spectator sport at Tyburn, now the site of Marble Arch; a public execution. This took various gruesome forms dependent upon the crime, but for the highwayman, a bog standard short drop hanging was the order of the day. This could keep the crowd amused for 20 minutes while the highwayman dangled on the end of the rope, and; ‘Danced the Tyburn jig’. To get to Tyburn, the condemned highwayman would be placed on a cart at Newgate prison, the site of the Old Bailey, driven through the crowded streets of the city stopping part way for a quart of ale before then meeting their fate in front of a few thousand merry Londoners. If the highwayman had any money, they could hire a coach to take them to Tyburn thus avoiding the sometimes jeering crowds along the route, thereby providing a day’s work for a coachman. It is not known if any tips were forthcoming.
Infrastructure and vehicles
Another hazard were the roads of the day. Up to that time, the only decent roads that had been built in this country had been constructed by the Romans. They were still in use but in a dire state of repair. Their condition didn’t improve when stagecoaches with iron rimmed wheels started using them with increased regularity. Generally they were just tracks through the countryside riven with ruts and potholes that caused damage and danger for the stagecoaches and their passengers. The weather could also affect the stagecoach’s schedule. Heavy rain would cause impassable flooding. Rain would turn the highway into a muddy morass impeding progress. Bridges were also precarious being in many cases old and in poor repair.
The stagecoaches themselves were demanding vehicles to drive. As a result, coachmen enjoyed the status of later groups of public transport workers like steam engine drivers and airline pilots, but they earned their respect – if they survived. The coaches were inherently unstable because of their high centre of gravity. Instead of improving matters, the instability was only made worse by loading up to 10 people – sometimes more – on top of the stagecoach with luggage and also parcels that the coachmen delivered crammed in around them. This no doubt increased profitability, but meant that a lot of coaches turned over resulting in the driver going flying. They didn’t always survive.
Then there were the horses to deal with. The coachman had to get the best out of teams of troublesome and difficult beasts. It would have been tricky had horses been relaxed, placid creatures not given to being easily spooked. Horses aren’t. We use the term ‘beast’ in a rather glib manner today to describe machines. Okay, drivers sometimes have tricky manuals and temperamental computer programmed automatics to deal with, but they are not beasts. It was okay if a coachman drove a regular stage with familiar horses. It was when a coachman had to deal with horses he didn’t know that tragedy could strike. It wasn’t uncommon for horses to be spooked and to take off on their own, even if the ostler was trying to hold them. Blind horses were another tricky feature of the working day. Trouble could arise when coachmen took over a new team. The ostler at the changeover inn may have put their harnesses on, but it was up to the coachman to check it had been done properly. Some, in a hurry, didn’t bother, with predictable results. Even back then, it was wise to carry out your horse round check. There was also the risk of fire if the axles hadn’t been lubricated properly.
Then there were the brakes. Well, actually, there weren’t any. On the level or going uphill, the skilled coachman could bring the coach to a slow, steady stop – if there wasn’t anything in the way. When going downhill, the practice was to fit a metal skid to the rear wheel to lock it so the stagecoach slid downhill helped by four brake horsepower to hold it back a bit. Some coachmen decided to dispense with even this safety feature when going downhill, sometimes with tragic consequences while travelling at a breakneck speed. There was also the risk that coachmen could get caught up in the reins, fall under the horses and be trampled to death. It was a dodgy business.
Finding your way was not always easy. These days we take things like signposts for granted. Not for the coachman. It wasn’t until 1697 that legislation was introduced that provided for ‘direction stones or posts’ to be installed at junctions. Signposts went up in many places quite quickly but in Devon, you would still be taking pot luck at junctions for another 15 years. Before that, well, you could always look at the map – couldn’t you? Again, this was an age where the modern world was just taking shape and with it such things as useable road maps were first making an appearance. The earliest map of the roads of England was produced by John Ogilby in 1675 in his road atlas, Britannia. His innovation was the strip map and his atlas covered 2,519 miles of roads in 100 strip maps. It was an impractical size and though you could buy the individual strip maps for the route you happened to be travelling along, it was another 50 years before more practical, smaller road atlases following the style of Ogilby’s strip maps were available.
Accommodation
At the end of a hard day on the road, the weary driver could look forward to a night at the motorway service stations of the day – the coaching inns, many of which can still be seen in the towns that stood on the main coaching routes. On average, these were situated some seven miles apart to fulfil their primary purpose of providing fresh teams of horses. They also provided food and, in the early days, overnight accommodation. This is where the drivers benefited from one of the perks of their job – free beer paid for by the passengers: and I’ve met a few drivers who still think that tradition continues! As you can imagine, driving a coach was thirsty work on the sometimes dusty roads of the day. One can only speculate as to how thirsty this made the drivers, but one can assume they got their money’s worth out of the passengers. Tips from the passengers, then as now were another perk of the job, with a slight difference. In Restoration England, in order to be accepted as a gentleman, the size of your tips and the frequency with which they were given were a measure of your status. Those who thought highly of themselves would dispense tips of up to sixpence in order that everyone thought they were individuals of high status.
When it came to food, this would vary from inn to inn, but one thing you would have to carry with you was a knife to eat with. The inn would not provide knives and forks, as was the custom wherever you ate. It was the coachman that had to provide his own knife and fingers. The knife to cut the meat, and his fingers to eat the food. Forks started appearing late in the 17th century from Italy, but, initially, only for the well to do.
With regard to which hostelry to stop at, running a coaching inn was a competitive business, and in places like Honiton there could be a choice of up to 20 to choose from. The canny coachman would therefore look for those who provided the quickest service. When coaches were just stopping to change teams, the smart landlord would bring food and drink out to the stagecoach. Given that a team could be changed in minutes, it just goes to show that fast food isn’t a new thing. Presumably the 17th century coachman didn’t display signs on his vehicle banning food and drink on their vehicles.
When it came to the sleeping arrangements, this really could provide for a hard day’s night. Today’s drivers complain when they have to share a room – and rightly so, but at least when they have to share, they only have to share with one other person and, they get a bed to themselves. Life was a bit different in coaching inns. The fee charged by the inn was for food and stabling with a bed thrown in free. This allowed the landlord to cram as many people as possible into the available accommodation without giving anyone cause to complain about who they had to share their sleeping accommodation with. Many chambers had a number of beds in them. One chamber at an inn in Bristol had seven beds. The famous Great Bed at the English Champion in Ware was 3.38m long and 3.26m wide. You could have up to 11 bedmates if you slept there, or tried to sleep there. If you were very lucky, you might get a bed to yourself, but more likely you would be sharing the chamber and the bed with a number of other travellers. This was none too pleasant.
Personal hygiene was questionable at this time. Most people would wash their hands and face in cold water. For the rest of their bodies, they would rub themselves down with a linen cloth and that was very much that. The diaries of Samuel Pepys reveal that apart from one occasion when he enjoyed the waters at Bath, he did not fully immerse himself in water for the 10 years covered by his journals. Truth be told, most of the water of the day was a health hazard, which was why everyone drank ale, beer or wine as a matter of course. To keep clean (ish), it was expected that the linen under shirts that men wore would absorb the sweat, odours and dirt of the body. It would then be washed. The best that could said about the frequency of wash days was, well, they occurred periodically. The increasing use of sugar was rotting people’s teeth making their breath, well, ripe, and these were your sleeping companions. Mind you, you probably didn’t smell all that sweet yourself.
Sleep could be disturbed. Remember all that beer that was drunk? That could cause people to get up in the middle of the night. If you were on the edge of the bed, then you would have a disturbed night’s sleep. If it was your bladder that needed emptying, then if you were unlucky, you had to make your way in the dark to the outhouse out back that was situated over a cess pit. Coachmen needed a very strong stomach. If you were lucky, there would be en suite facilities: they were to be found under the bed. If someone had used them during the night, you hoped that when you woke up, they’d been put back under the bed. If not, then you might put your foot right in it! Not a great start to the day. Then there was the noise people made when they were asleep. Having shared a hospital ward with a dozen male patients, it was the closest I’ve come to sleeping in a farmyard. When you did wake up, you might have a stretch and a bit of a scratch. Don’t worry, it’s only nits, lice or fleas, but you probably had a few of those to begin with. So when the landlord asks you if you slept well, what are you going to say?
Working for royalty
If you wanted a more sedate life, there was the alternative of working for a wealthier member of 17th century England. A coach and four or even much, much better, a coach and six (a coach and six horses) was an impressive status symbol for the upper classes and there was a demand for skilled drivers. At this time there were some 9,000 coaches of varying sizes in London so there was a lot of work.
With the job went a much grander uniform, or livery as it was know then, to reflect the position and rank of your employer. You also visited some grander locations – the grander your employer, the grander the circles they moved in. So the coachman’s daily life when their employer was out socialising would have meant travelling to some of the finest houses in the land. While your employer was enjoying the fat of the land – and boy did they put it away – you would be directed to the servants’ quarters. Given that your job as a coachman was close to the top of the servant hierarchy of the day, you could expect to be treated accordingly by the servants of the house you’d taken your employer to. But take care, the food won’t do you that much harm, it’s when you’re plied with beer and ale that you have to be careful, particularly when you have to drive his lordship home. Mind you, he would probably be a bit squiffy himself, so providing you don’t end up in a ditch – always a risk on completely unlit roads at night – then you will keep your job. If you fell of your box (the place where the coachman sat) because you’d had too many, there were reports from the time that horses would find there own way home, particularly if they were hungry.
You have to be a careful driver though, even if you were sober. On March 8 1669 one coachman was taking his employer to the races at Newmarket. They set out early because his boss wanted to enjoy the sport of kings. In fact, he was the king, Charles II. In the coach with him were his brother, the duke of York, the future James II, the King’s illegitimate son, the duke of Monmouth – soon to make Sedgemoor famous as the site of the last battle fought on English soil – and Prince Rupert, the King’s nephew. It was early and dark and the lights on the coach didn’t illuminate the road very well. A wheel of the coach hit a rut in the road in Holborn, and over the coach went. History records that the party in the coach survived unscathed. It does not tell us what happened to the coachman!
Another means by which you could employ your skills and not risk upsetting the King was to drive a hackney carriage in London. At least you slept in your own bed with people you knew. Better the nits you know… Other work became available on the express mail coaches set up by the Post Office in 1784 and on the short stagecoaches in places like London. These were early commuter services which operated until horse-drawn omnibuses appeared in 1829.
Back to the present
Overall, for the day, it was a tough life driving a stagecoach in the 17th century and beyond.
The stagecoach survived as the leading form of public transport on land until the 1830s. Then the railways made the job of driving a coach more or less redundant for nearly a century until the charabancs appeared. By that time, the roads were much better, the vehicles much faster and the only people who were likely to stop you were the police for breaches of road traffic law.
However, some things don’t change. For coach drivers, as DVSA traffic examiners will soon have the power to issue on-the-spot fines to a maximum of £1,500 for up to five offences committed over the preceding 28 days, and will impound the coach until the fines are paid, there are those that might be tempted to say that highway robbery is still a fact of their working life. Will it now be: “Stand and deliver, driver. Your money or your coach?”
[/wlm_ismember]
