bring many changes in its wake, among them the rebuilding of the
comfortable old inns. He was old enough to have driven Mr. Pickwick, or
Mr. Pickwick’s originator, on that remarkably wet journey from
Birmingham to Towcester. It was probably at the old “King’s Head” that
the post-chaise team was changed that night. When they stopped, the
steam ascended from the horses in such clouds as wholly to obscure the
ostler, whose voice was, however, heard to declare from the mist that he
expected the first Gold Medal from the Humane Society, on their next
distribution of awards, for taking the postboy’s hat off; the water
descending from the brim of which, the invisible gentleman declared,
must inevitably have drowned him (the postboy) but for his great
presence of mind in tearing it promptly from his head, and drying the
gasping man’s countenance with a wisp of straw.
Here it was that Sam Weller, “lowering his voice to a mysterious
whisper,” asked Bob Sawyer if he had ever “know’d a churchyard where
there was a postboy’s tombstone,” or “had ever seen a dead postboy.”
“No!” rejoined Bob, “I never did.”
“No!” rejoined Sam, triumphantly, “nor never will; and there’s another
thing that no man never see, and that’s a dead donkey. No man never see
a dead donkey”; adding that, “without goin’ so far as to as-sert, as
some wery sensible people do, that postboys and donkeys is both
immortal, wot I say is this; that wenever they feels theirselves gettin’
stiff and past their work, they just rides off together, wun postboy to
a pair in the usual way; wot becomes on ’em nobody knows, but its werry
probable as they starts away to take their pleasure in some other vorld,
for there ain’t a man alive as ever see either a donkey or a postboy
a-taking his pleasure in this!”
The “King’s Head,” as already hinted, has been rebuilt in the stained
glass and glitter style, and is quite uninteresting, save for the effigy
of “Peeping Tom,” moved from the frontage of a neighbouring old house,
peering curiously from an upper storey.
XLV
Crossing the intersection of Hertford Street and Broad Gate at this
point, the Holyhead Road leads out of Coventry by way of Smithford
Street and Fleet Street. Before the revolutionary time of Telford, it
continued through Spon End and Spon Gate and reached Allesley along the
winding route now known as the “Old Allesley Road,” passing two
toll-gates on the way. The “new” road branches off to the right
immediately after passing St. John’s church and, passing a long
factory-like row of old weavers’ houses, and climbing uphill at first,
goes afterwards flat and straight to Allesley, in two miles. “Windmill
Hill,” as it was called, was not a very exalted height, but from it in
the old days a quite panoramic view of Coventry was obtainable. It is
the view, now blotted out by intervening houses, seen in Turner’s noble
picture of the city. In it you see the hollow road, with St. John’s
tower at the bottom, and coaches toiling up, on the way to Birmingham;
in the distance the neighbouring spires of Trinity and St. Michael’s,
with Christ Church aloof, on the right. Turner took his stand on the
hill-crest, where Meriden Street branches off to the right; but where
the grassy banks then sloped steeply to the road, and the sheep roamed
free, suburban villas now cover the hillside, the retaining walls of
their gardens masking the rugged old earth-banks.
[Illustration: COVENTRY, FROM WINDMILL HILL. _After J. M. W.
Turner, R.A._]
A red-brick toll-gate marks the junction of old and new roads at the
entrance of Allesley, a pretty roadside village on a hillside. There
were at one time two very large and busy coaching inns here, the
“Windmill” and the “White Lion,” and here they stand even now; not as
inns, it is true, but structurally unaltered. Very handsome red-brick
buildings they are, belonging to the Georgian and Queen Anne periods:
the “White Lion,” once famed for its cheesecakes and home-brewed ale,
prominent as the largest building in the village street, and now divided
into two houses; the “Windmill” half a mile away, standing back in a
meadow and used as a farmhouse.
Meriden, the next item upon the way, is heralded by a steeply descending
hill; the village below, the church solitary upon the hill-top. Meriden
church is quite a little museum of antiquities, and a well-kept one,
with everything carefully labelled for the information of the chance
visitor—and the door unlocked. Here one finds the effigies of two worthy
Warwickshire knights of the fifteenth century, a chained Prayer Book,
and the processional staves of a bygone village club, together with a
curious old oak alms-chest, dated 1627 and inscribed:
This chest is God’s exchequer, paye in then
Your almes accepted both of God and men.
“Mireden,” as it was invariably called by old-time travellers, is
situated on an “uncommonly deep” bed of clay in the hole at the foot of
this hill. Pennant, the antiquary, is responsible for the statement that
the village was named Alspath until the time of Henry VI., “about which
time, becoming a great thoroughfare, it got the name of Myreden—‘den’
signifying a bottom, and ‘myre’ dirt; and I can well vouch for the
propriety of the appellation before the institution of turnpikes.”
In his time, between 1739 and 1782, the road at Meriden had been so far
improved that travellers no longer stuck in the clay. It had become a
turnpike, and, on the testimony of Pennant, “excellent.” But the crest
of the hill had still to be climbed, and the depth of the valley to be
descended into, before the advent of Telford, some forty years later,
when the cutting on the hill-top and the embankment in the hollow were
made. The old road—a steep and narrow track—is seen down below, on the
right hand, in descending Meriden Hill, and beside it the old “Queen’s
Head,” with frontage rebuilt in recent years. Meriden village lies in
the succeeding level, with rural cottages on one side of the road, and
the ponds and lilied watercourses of Meriden Park on the other; a
village green beyond. The houses are still, as in Pennant’s day
“pretty”; but in the course of a hundred and twenty years the
“magnificent inn, famed from time immemorial for its excellent malt
liquor,” has retired into private occupation, and the “various
embellishments made by the old innkeeper, Reynolds—little ponds,
statues, and other whims,” that used to enliven the spot, have been
swept away by Time, like old Reynolds himself.
[Illustration: THE OLD “BULL’S HEAD,” MERIDEN.]
There were in coaching days no fewer than eight inns and posting-houses
of different degrees in Meriden. There are now but two inns: the “Bull’s
Head,” formerly a farmhouse, and the “Queen’s Head,” already mentioned.
Among the vanished signs are the “Nag’s Head,” “Malt Shovel,” “Crown,”
and “Swan” (now a butcher’s shop). The magnificent inn spoken of by
Pennant was the old “Bull’s Head”; whence the licence was transferred to
the smaller house, now so named, at the time when coaching ceased to be.
The old house is seen on the right hand, a very large, white-plastered
building of good architectural character, now secluded from the road by
a wall and iron palisade, standing where the drive up to the inn was
formerly placed. One of the entrances to and exits from the house in
coaching and posting times was by the first-floor window, above where
the portico, a later addition, is seen. The “Bull’s Head” was an
exclusive and aristocratic house, and preferred the top-sawyers, who
posted in their own “chariots,” to those who travelled in hired chaises;
while for the mere passengers by mail or stage-coach it had, at the
best, but a contemptuous tolerance. And, indeed, it must have been a
lordly place, and, with its surrounding gardens, stables, and
picturesque turreted clock-tower, more like a private mansion than a
place of public resort. There is still in the turret a dilapidated set
of chimes that can, with care and patience, be induced to hammer out a
few scattered notes of a tune alleged to be that of “God Save the King,”
or Queen, as the case may be.
XLVI
Meriden is one of the many reputed “centres of England.” Measure a
straight line from the North Foreland to Holyhead, and another from the
Lizard to the mouth of the Humber, and their intersection will be at
Meriden. With an irregularly shaped country like England, this is a
somewhat empirical method, and the other reputed centres are evidently
obtained by measuring from various places dictated by individual taste
and fancy.
The very hub of the country is held to be the ancient cross standing
upon the village green—shattered now, and bound together by iron bands.
A modern legend that it was originally placed here to mark the centre
has grown up, and by consequence it is sketched and photographed times
without number throughout the year.
The “Forest of Arden Archers,” or the “Woodmen of Arden,” as they
sometimes style themselves, an ancient guild revived in 1785, and
holding meetings at Forest Hall, near by, remind the forgetful traveller
that, like Touchstone, he is in Arden, or, at any rate, on the outskirts
of it, in passing through Meriden. Henley-in-Arden lies to the left,
served by a station, bald of any poetic or romantic suggestion in the
title of “Henley Junction.”
[Illustration: MERIDEN CROSS.]
There remained, not so many years ago, an old inn called the “Up and
Down Post,” on the road between Meriden and Stonebridge. Its
picture-sign, showing two posts, one standing, the other fallen, quite
misrepresented the true meaning of the name, which referred to the old
system of posting along the roads. Probably the original sign was a
picture showing the up and the down postboys meeting.
The road now grows to a noble width; a quiet road too, at any time but
Saturdays and Sundays, when Birmingham and Coventry’s all sorts of the
cycling kind are let loose upon their eighteen miles between the two
cities, and motor cars from afar, whiten the hedgerows with dust. The
old “Stonebridge” inn, at the crossing of the Lichfield and Leamington
roads, has been gorgeously rebuilt, chiefly to meet the requirements of
these, and is now the “Stonebridge Hotel.” The “stone bridge” itself
carries the road across a little stream called the Tame. Another inn,
the “Malt Shovel,” stands with its old stables in refreshing contrast
with that ornate modern hostelry.
A very little exertion will suffice to put the quiet man out of sight
and hearing of the crowd. He has only to turn up the lane by the “Clock”
inn and make for Bickenhill spire, less than a quarter of a mile away,
and he will have the surroundings entirely to himself.
Bickenhill church is very beautiful, but perhaps the most memorable
thing connected with it is the notice exposed in the porch:—
It having been decided by the Court of Queen’s Bench, and by the
Court of Appeal, that artificial wreaths and glass cases placed upon
graves without sanction is an illegal act; notice is hereby given
that such must not be placed upon graves without first obtaining
permission, and such will be regarded as Memorial Tablets, and the
customary fees will be charged.
The vicar’s grammar would not have found favour with Lindley Murray; but
speculations as to how an artificial wreath or a glass case can be made
an act, illegal or otherwise, do not form the real interest of this
notice. _That_ is discovered in the spectacle of two judicial tribunals
assuming the rôle of arbiters of taste, and elevating the placing of
jampots, enamelled tin wreaths, and the like abominations on graves to
illegality. No one can, without mingled feelings of disgust and pity,
see the marmalade jars that have held water for flowers, or any
artificial things displayed in places with such sacred and melancholy
associations, but this would seem to be a question of taste, or the want
of it, alone. It would not be a much greater stride for courts of law to
determine in what kind of clothes parishioners should attend service.
And—another matter. Without defending artificial flowers, are the
decayed natural blossoms, shrivelled with heat, and soddened into an
obscene and hideous pulp by rains, a pleasing sight? Is it not possible,
after all, that the sense of permanency in a glass case or a glass
chaplet is a soothing feeling to many a poor mourner who lacks
“culture,” but whose instincts revolt from the rotting lilies and
stephanotis of the bereaved rich?
[Illustration: THE LIVERPOOL MAIL, 1836. _From a Print after J.
Pollard._]
Returning to Stonebridge, the road to Coleshill, and to Castle Bromwich
and Lichfield will be seen branching off from the Holyhead Road. Here,
until the middle of the eighteenth century, the traffic for Shrewsbury
and Chester commonly turned off. After that date, not only were the
roads through Birmingham and Wolverhampton improved, but the places
themselves grew into greater importance, and the old Chester Road, by
consequence, decayed. By 1802 all the Chester coaches had deserted it,
but the Liverpool Mail came this way until the last. Up to 1761 this was
not the way to Coleshill at all. Until that year the road branched off
at a point half a mile from Meriden, and lay through Packington Park. It
was a straight and flat road, and convenient for Coleshill, but
offensive to Sir Clement Fisher, who then was the squire at Packington
Hall. It passed within sight of his windows, and he relaxed no effort
until an Act of Parliament was passed, stopping it up, and making the
present hilly and circuitous road in its stead. The preamble of the Act,
stating that the old road was inconvenient and dangerous, is one of the
most audacious falsehoods ever publicly stated. The old road can still
be traced in the Park, and standing beside it is an old tombstone,
recording the fate of a London tailor struck by lightning when
travelling this way.
XLVII
But enough of Packington. Let us on to Birmingham, now but nine miles
distant, by Elmdon, Wells Green, and Yardley.
Elmdon, were it not for that pretty roadside timber-framed inn, the
‘Cock,’ would be but a name and nothing else, so far as the road could
show. Passing it, bid a long farewell, O traveller along the Holyhead
Road, to the country, for in less than another two miles Wells Green is
reached and Birmingham within hail. Thereafter, in nothing less than
eighteen miles shall you see the hedgerows, the fields, and the quiet
road again. Birmingham and the Black Country intervene, and not until,
having gained and overpassed Wolverhampton, you ascend the heights of
Tettenhall, will the sun be seen shining in a clear sky once more.
Meanwhile, here is Wells Green, the last approach to the likeness of the
country on this side of Birmingham, and by consequence a place of great
half-holiday and Sunday resort. Midland cyclists are its chief patrons.
For them the “Old Original” tea-house caters, for their custom also the
“Ship,” the “Lighthouse,” and many more compete frantically among each
other, attracting attention by large and elaborate models of ships,
lighthouses, and other objects displayed beside the road. The two old
roadside inns—the “Wheatsheaf” and the “Crown”—have been ornately
rebuilt; the “Crown” vulgarly.
Beyond Wells Green the road enters an outlying portion of Worcestershire
and comes to Yardley, a new-built Birmingham suburb, whose shops, dotted
here and there by the wayside, alternate with barns, cow-houses and
hedges, presently to give place to suburban streets and so provide those
shops with customers. In the hollow succeeding Yardley, at Hay Mills,
where a little stream runs, not yet completely polluted and decently
buried from sight in a drain pipe, the mile’s length of Worcestershire
ends. Hay Mills now belies its idyllic name, for it is here that modern
Birmingham definitely begins, and the smoke-cloud and traffic of that
great city grow in density.
Small Heath, Bordesley, Deritend, and Digbeth, that are all comprised in
the next two and a half miles, are now but the various names
distinguishing what would otherwise be one long street, growing
gradually more grimy and crowded : a hilly street, where hideous steam
tramways, belching smoke and smuts, run noisily, like armoured trains,
and where the few old gabled cottages that are left, to tell of times
when this was a country road, are closely beset by modern houses,
already hung with soot, like the cobwebs on bottles of old port. A
dramatic change indeed from what Leland saw, when he journeyed to
Birmingham in 1538, and came “through as pretty a street as ever I
entred, into Bermingham towne. This street, as I remember, is called
Dirtey.” He meant Deritend, which, if called “Dirtey” to-day would by no
means be libelled. “Dirty End” would be an easy change from the real
name of the squalid street, and equally descriptive of it.
Wigstead in 1797 tells a tale very different from that of Leland.
Instead of a “pretty street,” he found an entrance “by no means
prepossessing the traveller in its favour—a confused mass of brick and
tile rubbish piled together.” Birmingham he thought to be an
objectionable place. “Enveloped in an almost impenetrable smoky
atmosphere,” he says, “it is by no means an agreeable object to a
picturesque eye.”
END OF VOL. 1
_Printed by Hazell, Watson & Viney, Ltd., Lowloa and Aylesbury._
WORKS BY THE SAME AUTHOR.
=The Brighton Road=: Old Times and New on a Classic Highway.
=The Portsmouth Road=: and its Tributaries, To-day and in Days of Old.
=The Dover Road=: Annals of an Ancient Turnpike.
=The Bath Road=: History, Fashion, and Frivolity on an old Highway.
=The Exeter Road=: The Story of the West of England Highway.
=The Great North Road=: The Old Mail Road to Scotland. 2 Vols.
=The Norwich Road=: An East Anglian Highway.
=The Oxford Gloucester, and Milford Haven Road.=
[_In the Press._
=Cycle Rides Round London.=
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TRANSCRIBER’S NOTES
1. Moved advertisement from the second page to the end.
2. Silently corrected typographical errors and variations in spelling.
3. Retained anachronistic, non-standard, and uncertain spellings as
printed.
4. Footnotes have been re-indexed using numbers.
5. Enclosed italics font in _underscores_.
6. Enclosed bold font in =equals=.
7. Superscripts are denoted by a caret before a single superscript
character or a series of superscripted characters enclosed in
curly braces, e.g. M^r. or M^{ister}.
End of Project Gutenberg's The Holyhead Road Vol 1, by Charles G. Harper