Produced by The Online Distributed Proofreading Team at
http://www.pgdp.net (This file was produced from images
generously made available by The Internet Archive.)
THE PORTSMOUTH ROAD
WORKS BY THE SAME AUTHOR.
=ENGLISH PEN ARTISTS OF TO-DAY=: Examples of their work, with some
Criticisms and Appreciations. Super royal 4to, L3 3_s._ net.
=THE BRIGHTON ROAD=: Old Times and New on a Classic Highway. With 95
Illustrations by the Author and from old prints. Demy 8vo, 16_s._
=FROM PADDINGTON TO PENZANCE=: The Record of a Summer Tramp. With 105
Illustrations by the Author. Demy 8vo, 16_s._
=A PRACTICAL HANDBOOK OF DRAWING FOR MODERN METHODS OF REPRODUCTION.=
Illustrated by the Author and others. Demy 8vo, 7_s._ 6_d._
=THE MARCHES OF WALES=: Notes and Impressions on the Welsh Borders, from
the Severn Sea to the Sands o' Dee. With 115 Illustrations by the Author
and from old-time portraits. Demy 8vo, 16_s._
=REVOLTED WOMAN=: Past, Present, and to Come. Illustrated by the Author
and from old-time portraits. Demy 8vo, 5_s._ net.
=THE DOVER ROAD=: Annals of an Ancient Turnpike. With 100 Illustrations by
the Author and from other sources. Demy 8vo. [_In the Press._
[Illustration:
"_Till, woe is me, so lubberly,
The vermin came and pressed me._"
_From a painting by George Morland._]
_THE PORTSMOUTH
ROAD AND ITS TRIBUTARIES:
TO-DAY AND IN DAYS OF OLD._
BY CHARLES G. HARPER,
AUTHOR OF The Brighton Road,
Marches of Wales, Drawing for
Reproduction, &c., &c., &c.
[Illustration]
_Illustrated by the Author, and from
Old-time Prints and Pictures._
LONDON: CHAPMAN & HALL LIMITED
1895
(_All Rights Reserved._)
RICHARD CLAY & SONS, LIMITED,
LONDON & BUNGAY.
TO HENRY REICHARDT, ESQ.
_My dear Reichardt,_
_Here is the result of two years' hard work for your perusal; the outcome
of delving amid musty, dusty files of by-gone newspapers; of research
among forgotten books, and pamphlets curious and controversial; of country
jaunts along this old road both for pleasures sake and for taking the
notes and sketches that go towards making up the story of this old
highway._
_You will appreciate, more than most, the difficulties of contriving a
well-ordered narrative of times so clean forgotten as those of old-road
travel, and better still will you perceive the largeness of the task of
transmuting the notes and sketches of this undertaking into paper and
print. Hence this dedication._
_Yours, &c._,
CHARLES G. HARPER.
Preface
_There has been of late years a remarkable and widespread revival of
interest in the old coach-roads of England; a revival chiefly owing to the
modern amateur's enthusiasm for coaching; partly due to the healthy sport
and pastime of cycling, that brings so many afield from populous cities
who would otherwise grow stunted in body and dull of brain; and in degree
owing to the contemplative spirit that takes delight in scenes of by-gone
commerce and activity, prosaic enough, to the most of them that lived in
the Coaching Age, but now become hallowed by mere lapse of years and the
supersession of horse-flesh by steam-power._
_The Story of the Roads belongs now to History, and History is, to your
thoughtful man, quite as interesting as the best of novels. Sixty years
ago the Story of the Roads was brought to an end, and at that time (so
unheeded is the romance of every-day life) it seemed a story of the most
commonplace type, not worthy the telling. But we have gained what was of
necessity denied our fathers and grandfathers in this matter--the charm of
Historical Perspective, that lends a saving grace to experiences of the
most ordinary description, and to happenings the most untoward. Our
forebears travelled the roads from necessity, and saw nothing save
unromantic discomforts in their journeyings to and fro. We who read the
records of their times are apt to lament their passing, and to wish the
leisured life and not a few of the usages of our grandfathers back again.
The wish is vain, but natural, for it is a characteristic of every
succeeding generation to look back lovingly on times past, and in the
retrospect to see in roseate colours what was dull and, neutral-tinted to
folk who lived their lives in those by-gone days._
_If we only could pierce to the thought of aeons past, perhaps we should
find the men of the Stone Age regretting the times of the Arboreal
Ancestor, and should discover that distant relative, while swinging by his
prehensile tail from the branches of some forest tree, lamenting the
careless, irresponsible life of his remote forebear, the Primitive
Pre-atomic Globule._
_However that may be, certain it is that when our day is done, when Steam
shall have been dethroned and natural forces of which we know nothing have
revolutionized the lives of our descendants, those heirs of all the ages
will look back regretfully upon this Era of ours, and wistfully meditate
upon the romantic life we led towards the end of the nineteenth century!_
_The glamour of old-time travel has appealed to me equally with others of
my time, and has led me to explore the old coach-roads and their records.
Work of this kind is a pleasure, and the programme I have mapped out of
treating all the classic roads of England in this wise, is, though long
and difficult, not (to quote a horsey phrase suitable to this subject) all
"collar work."_
CHARLES G. HARPER.
35, CONNAUGHT STREET, HYDE PARK,
LONDON, _April 1895_.
LIST _of_ ILLVSTRATIONS
SEPARATE PLATES
PAGE
1. THE PRESS GANG. _By George Morland._ Frontispiece.
2. OLD "ELEPHANT AND CASTLE," 1824 22
3. "ELEPHANT AND CASTLE," 1826 30
4. ADMIRAL BYNG 48
5. A STRANGE SIGHT SOME TIME HENCE 52
6. THE SHOOTING OF ADMIRAL BYNG 56
7. WILLIAM PITT 74
8. THE RECRUITING SERGEANT 90
9. ROAD AND RAIL: DITTON MARSH, NIGHT 94
10. THE "NEW TIMES" GUILDFORD COACH 98
11. THE "TALLY-HO" HAMPTON COURT AND DORKING COACH 104
12. MICKLEHAM CHURCH 108
13. BROCKHAM BRIDGE 114
14. ESHER PLACE 120
15. LORD CLIVE 124
16. PRINCESS CHARLOTTE OF WALES 128
17. THE "ANCHOR," RIPLEY 142
18. GUILDHALL, GUILDFORD 148
19. CASTLE ARCH 152
20. AN INN YARD, 1747. _After Hogarth_ 162
21. THE "RED ROVER" GUILDFORD AND SOUTHAMPTON COACH 166
22. ST. CATHERINE'S CHAPEL. _After J. M. W. Turner_ 170
23. MARY TOFTS 178
24. NEW GODALMING STATION 184
25. THE DEVIL'S PUNCH BOWL 194
26. HINDHEAD. _After J. M. W. Turner_ 198
27. TYNDALL'S HOUSE 208
28. SAMUEL PEPYS 236
29. JOHN WILKES 240
30. SAILORS CAROUSING. _From a Sketch by Rowlandson_ 252
31. THE "FLYING BULL" INN 268
32. PETERSFIELD MARKET-PLACE 278
33. THE "COACH AND HORSES" INN 298
34. CATHERINGTON CHURCH 320
35. AN EXTRAORDINARY SCENE ON THE PORTSMOUTH ROAD.
_By Rowlandson_ 330
36. THE SAILOR'S RETURN 334
37. TRUE BLUE; OR BRITAIN'S JOLLY TARS PAID OFF AT
PORTSMOUTH, 1797. _By Isaac Cruikshank_ 338
38. THE LIBERTY OF THE SUBJECT, 1782. _By James
Gillray_ 346
ILLUSTRATIONS IN TEXT
PAGE
The Revellers 12
Edward Gibbon 19
"Dog and Duck" Tavern 28
Sign of the "Dog and Duck" 29
Jonas Hanway 43
"If the shades of those antagonists foregather" 44
The First Umbrella 46
The "Green Man," Putney Heath 70
The Windmill, Wimbledon Common 74
Mr. Walter Shoolbred 97
Boots at the "Bear" 102
The "Bear," Esher 103
Burford Bridge 111
The "White Horse," Dorking 112
The Road to Dorking 113
Castle Mill 117
Cobham Churchyard 137
Pain's Hill 139
Fame up-to-Date 142
Herbert Liddell Cortis 146
Market-House, Godalming 176
Charterhouse Relics 189
Gowser Jug 190
Wesley 191
Bust of Nelson 192
Tombstone, Thursley 204
Thursley Church 205
Sun-dial, Thursley 206
"Considering Cap" 223
Milland Chapel 260
"The Wakes," Selborne 261
Badge of the Selborne Society 267
The "Flying Bull" Sign 271
The "Jolly Drovers" 272
"Shaved with Trouble and Cold Water" 284
Edward Gibbon 288
Windy Weather 304
Benighted 319
Dancing Sailor 361
THE ROAD TO PORTSMOUTH
Miles
Stone's End, Borough, to--
Newington 1/4
Vauxhall 1-1/2
Battersea Rise 4
Wandsworth (cross River Wandle) 5-1/2
Tibbet's Corner, Putney Heath 7-3/4
"Robin Hood," Kingston Vale 9
Norbiton Church 11-1/4
Kingston Market-place 12
Thames Ditton 13-3/4
Esher 16
Cobham Street (cross River Mole) 19-1/2
Wisley Common 20-1/4
Ripley 23-1/2
Guildford (cross River Wey) 29-1/2
St. Catherine's Hill 30-1/2
Peasmarsh Common (cross River Wey) 31-1/4
Godalming 34
Milford 35-3/4
Moushill and Witley Commons 36-1/4
Hammer Ponds 38-1/2
Hindhead (Gibbet Hill) 41-1/4
Cold Ash Hill and "Seven Thorns" Inn 44-1/4
Liphook ("Royal Anchor") 46-3/4
Milland Common 47-1/2
Rake 50-1/4
Sheet Bridge (cross River Rother) 53-3/4
Petersfield 55
"Coach and Horses" 59
Horndean 62-1/2
Waterlooville and White Lane End 65-1/2
Purbrook (cross Purbrook stream) 66-1/2
Cosham 68-1/4
Hilsea 69-1/2
North End 70-3/4
Landport 71-1/2
Portsmouth Town 72
Portsmouth, Victoria Pier 73
_The Portsmouth Road_
I
The Portsmouth Road is measured (or was measured when road-travel was the
only way of travelling on _terra firma_, and coaches the chiefest machines
of progression) from the Stone's End, Borough. It went by Vauxhall to
Wandsworth, Putney Heath, Kingston-on-Thames, Guildford, and Petersfield;
and thence came presently into Portsmouth through the Forest of Bere and
past the frowning battlements of Porchester. The distance was, according
to Cary,--that invaluable guide, philosopher, and friend of our
grandfathers,--seventy-one miles, seven furlongs; and our forebears who
prayerfully entrusted their bodies to the dangers of the roads and
resigned their souls to Providence, were hurried along this route at the
break-neck speed of something under eight miles an hour, with their hearts
in their mouths and their money in their boots for fear of the highwaymen
who infested the roads, from London suburbs to the gates of Portsmouth
Citadel.
"Cary's Itinerary" for 1821 gives nine hours as the speediest journey
performed in that year by what was then considered the meteoric and
previously unheard-of swiftness of the "Rocket," which, in that new and
most fashionable era of mail and stage-coach travelling, had deserted the
grimy and decidedly unfashionable precincts of the Borough and the
"Elephant and Castle," for modish Piccadilly. So imagine the "Rocket" (do
you not perceive the subtle allusion to speed in that title?) starting
from the "White Bear," Piccadilly, which stood where the "Criterion" now
soars into the clouds--any morning at nine o'clock, to the flourishes of
the guard's "yard of tin," and to the admiration of a motley crowd of
'prentice-boys; Corinthians, still hazy in their ideas and unsteady on
their legs from debauches and card-playing in the night-houses of the
Haymarket round the corner; and of a frowzy, importunate knot of Jew
pedlars, and hawkers of all manner of useful and useless things which
might, to a vivid imagination, seem useful on a journey by coach. Away,
with crack of whip, tinful, rather than tuneful, fanfare, performed by
scarlet-coated, purple-faced guard, and with merry rattle of harness, to
Putney, where, upon the Heath, the coach joined the
"... old road, the high-road,
The road that's always new,"
thus to paraphrase the poet.
They were jolly coach-loads that fared along the roads in coaching days,
and, truly, all their jollity was needed, for unearthly hours,
insufficient protection from inclement weather, and the tolerable
certainty of falling in with thieves on their way, were experiences and
contingencies that, one might imagine, could scarce fail of depressing the
most buoyant spirits. But our forebears were composed of less delicate
nerves and tougher thews and sinews than ourselves. Possibly they had not
our veneer of refinement; they certainly possessed a most happy ignorance
of science and art; of microbes, and all the recondite ailments that
perplex us moderns, they knew nothing; they did all their work by that
glorious rule, the rule of thumb; and for their food, they lived on roast
beef and home-brewed ale, and damned kickshaws, new-fangled notions,
gentility, and a hundred other innovations whole-heartedly, like so many
Cobbetts. And Cobbett, in very truth, is the pattern and exemplar of the
old-time Englishman, who cursed tea, paper money, "gentlemen" farmers, and
innumerable things that, innovations then, have long since been cast aside
as old-fashioned and out of date.
[Sidenote: _THE ENGLISHMAN OF YORE_]
The Englishman of the days of road-travel was a much more robust person
than the Englishman of railway times. He had to be! The weaklings were all
killed off by the rigours of the undeniably harder winters than we
experience to-day, and by the rough-and-ready conditions of existence that
made for the survival of the strongest constitutions. Luxurious times and
easier conditions of life breed their own peculiar ills, and the
Englishman of a hundred years ago was a very fine animal indeed, who knew
little of nerves, and, altogether, compared greatly to his own advantage
with his neuralgia-stricken descendants of to-day.
Still, our ancestors saw nothing of the romance of their times. That has
been left for us to discover, and that glamour in which we see their age
is one afforded only by the lapse of time.
No: coaching days had their romance, more obvious perhaps to ourselves
than to those who lived in the times of road-travel; but most certainly
they had their own peculiar discomforts which we who are hurled at express
speed in luxurious Pullman cars, or in the more exclusive and less
sociable "first," to our destination would never endure were railways
abolished and the coaching era come again. I should imagine that
three-fourths of us would remain at home.
[Sidenote: _COACHING MISERIES_]
Here are some of the coaching miseries experienced by one who travelled
before steam had taken the place of good horseflesh, and, sooth to say,
there is not much in the nature of romantic glamour attaching to them:--
_Misery number one._ Although your place has been contingently secured
some days before, and although you have risen with the lark, yet you see
the ponderous vehicle arrive full. And this, not unlikely, more than once.
2. At the end of a stage, beholding the four panting, reeking, foaming
animals which have dragged you twelve miles, and the stiff, galled,
scraggy relay, crawling and limping out of the yard.
3. Being politely requested, at the foot of a tremendous hill, to ease the
horses. Mackintoshes, vulcanized india-rubber, gutta-percha, and gossamer
dust-coats unknown then.
4. An outside passenger, resolving to endure no longer "the pelting of the
pitiless storm," takes refuge, to your consternation, inside; together
with his dripping hat, saturated cloak, and soaked umbrella.
5. Set down with a promiscuous party to a meal bearing no resemblance to
that of a good hotel, excepting in the charge; and no time allowed in
which to enjoy it.
6. Closely packed in a box, "cabin'd, cribb'd, confin'd, bound in," with
_five_ companions morally or physically obnoxious, for two or three
comfortless days and nights.
7. During a halt overhearing the coarse language of the ostlers and the
tipplers of the roadside pot-house: and besieged with beggars exposing
their horrible mutilations.
8. Roused from your fitful nocturnal slumber by the horn or bugle; the
lashing and cracking of whips; the noisy arrivals at turnpike gates, or by
a search for parcels (which, after all, are not there) under your seat: to
say nothing of solicitous drivers who pester you with their entirely
uncalled-for attentions.
9. Discovering, at a diverging-point in your journey, that the "Tally-ho"
coach runs only every other day or so, or that it has been finally
stopped.
10. Clambering from the wheel by various iron projections to your
elevated seat, fearful, all the while, of breaking your precious neck.
11. After threading the narrowest streets of an ancient town, entering the
inn-yard by a low archway, at the imminent risk of decapitation.
12. Seeing the luggage piled "Olympus high," so as to occasion an alarming
oscillation.
13. Having the reins and whip placed in your unpractised hands while
coachee indulges in a glass and chat.
14. To be, when dangling at the edge of a seat, overcome with drowsiness.
15. Exposed to piercing draughts, owing to a refractory glass; or, _vice
versa_, being in a minority, you are compelled, for the sake of
ventilation, to thrust your umbrella accidentally through a pane.
16. At various seasons, suffocated with dust and broiled by a powerful
sun; or crouching under an umbrella in a drenching rain--or petrified with
cold--torn by fierce winds--struggling through snow--or wending your way
through perilous floods.
17. Perceiving that a young squire is receiving an initiatory lesson into
the art of driving; or that a jibbing horse, or a race with an opposition
coach, is endangering your existence.
18. Losing the enjoyment, or employment, of much precious time, not only
on the road, but also from subsequent fatigue.
19. Interrupted by your two rough-coated, big-buttoned, many-caped
friends, the coachman and guard, who hope you will remember them before
the termination of your hurried meal. Although the gratuity has been
frequently calculated in anticipation, you fail in making the mutual
reminiscences agreeable.
Clearly this was no _laudator temporis acti_.
II
But there are two sides to every medal, and it would be quite as easy to
draw up an equally long and convincing list of the joys of coaching. It
was not always raining or snowing when you wished to go a journey.
Highwaymen were always too many, but they did not lurk in every lane; and
the coach was not overturned on every journey, nor, even when a coach
_did_ upset, were the spilled passengers killed and injured with the
revolting circumstance and hideous complexity of a railway accident. On a
trip by coach, it was possible to see something of the country and to fill
one's lungs with fresh air, instead of coal-smoke and sulphur--and so
forth, _ad infinitum_!
[Sidenote: _THE COACHING AGE_]
The Augustan age of coaching,--by which I mean the period when George IV.
was king,--was celebrated for the number of gentlemen-drivers who ran
smart coaches upon the principal roads from London. Many of them mounted
the box-seat for the sake of sport alone: others, who had run through
their property and come to grief after the manner of the time, became
drivers of necessity. They could fulfil no other useful occupation, for at
that day professionalism was confined only to the Ring, and although
professors of the Noble Art of Self-Defence were admired and (in a sense)
envied, they were not gentlemen, judge them by what standard you please.
What was a poor Corinthian to do? To beg he would have been ashamed, to
dig would have humiliated him no less; the only way to earn a living and
yet retain the respect of his fellows, was to become a stage-coachman. He
had practically no alternative. Not yet had the manly sports of cricket
and football produced their professionals; lawn-tennis and cycling were
not dreamed of, and the professional riders, the "makers' amateurs,"
subsidized heavily from Coventry, were a degraded class yet to be evolved
by the young nineteenth century. So coachmen the young Randoms and
Rake-hells of the times became, and let us do them the justice to admit
that when they possessed handles to their names, they had the wit and
right feeling to see that those accidents of their birth gave them no
licence to assume "side" in the calling they had chosen for the love of
sport or from the spur of necessity. If they were proud by nature, they
pocketed their pride. They drove their best, took their fares, and
pocketed their tips with the most ordinary members of the coaching
fraternity, and they were a jolly band. Such were Sir St. Vincent Cotton;
Stevenson of the "Brighton Age," a graduate he of Trinity College,
Cambridge; and Captain Tyrwhitt Jones.
[Sidenote: _GENTLEMEN COACHMEN_]
St. Vincent Cotton, known familiarly to his contemporaries as "Vinny," was
one who drove a coach for a livelihood, and was not ashamed to own it. He
became reduced, as a consequence of his own folly, from an income of five
thousand a year to nothing; but he took Fortune's frowns with all the
nonchalance of a true sportsman, and was to all appearance as
light-hearted when he drove for a weekly wage as when he handled the reins
upon his own drag.
"One day," says one who knew him, "an old friend booked a place and got up
on the box-seat beside him, and a jolly five hours they had behind one of
the finest teams in England. When they came to their journey's end, the
friend was rather put to it as to what he ought to do; but he frankly put
out his hand to shake hands, and offered him a sovereign. 'No, no,' said
the coachman. 'Put that in your pocket, and give me the half-crown you
give to another coachman; and always come by me, and tell all your friends
and my old friends to do the same. A sovereign might be all very well for
once, but if you think that necessary for to-day you would not like to
feel it necessary the many times in the year you run down this way.
Half-a-crown is the trade price. Stick to that, and let us have many a
merry meeting and talk of old times.'"
"What was right," says our author, "he took as a matter of course in his
business, as I can testify by what happened between him and two of my
young brothers. They had to go to school at the town to which their old
friend the new coachman drove. Of course they would go by him whom they
had known all their little lives. They booked their places and paid their
money, and were proud to sit behind their friend with such a splendid
team.
"The Baronet chaffed and had fun with the boys, as he was always
hail-fellow-well-met with every one, old and young, all the way down; and
at the end, when he shook hands and did not see them prepare to give him
anything, he said, as they were turning away, 'Now, you young chaps,
hasn't your father given you anything for the coachman?'
"'Yes,' they said, looking sheepish, 'he gave us two shillings each, but
we didn't know what to do: we daren't give it to you.'
"'Oh,' said he, 'it's all right. You hand it over to me and come back with
me next holidays, and bring me a coach-full of your fellows. Good-bye.'"
"I drive for a livelihood," said the Baronet to a friend. "Jones,
Worcester, and Stevenson have their liveried servants behind, who pack the
baggage and take all short fares and pocket all the fees. That's all very
well for them. I do all myself, and the more civil I am (particularly to
the old ladies) the larger fees I get." And with that he stowed away a
trunk in the boot, and turning down the steps, handed into the coach, with
the greatest care and civility, a fat old woman, saying as he remounted
the box, "There, that will bring me something like a fee."
The Baronet made three hundred a year out of this coach, and got his sport
out of it for nothing.
III
The "Rocket," and the other fashionable West-end coaches of the Regency
and George IV.'s reign, scorning the plebeian starting-point of the
"Elephant and Castle," whence the second and third-rate coaches, the
"rumble-tumbles" and the stage-wagons set out, took their departure from
the old City inns, and, calling at the Piccadilly hostelries on their way,
crossed the Thames at Putney, even as Captain Hargreaves' modern
Portsmouth "Rocket" did in the notable coaching revival some years since,
and as Mr. Shoolbred's Guildford coach, the "New Times," does now.
[Sidenote: _OLD PUTNEY BRIDGE_]
Here they paid their tolls at the old bridge--eighteenpence a time--and
laboriously toiled up the long hill that leads to Putney Heath, not
without some narrow escapes of the "outsiders" from having their heads
brought into sudden and violent contact with the archway of the old
toll-house that--though by no means picturesque in itself--was so strange
and curious an object in its position, straddling across the roadway.
What Londoner worthy the name does not regret the old crazy, timbered
bridge that connected Fulham with Putney? Granted that it was
inconveniently narrow, and humped in unexpected places, like a dromedary;
conceded that its many and mazy piers obstructed navigation and hindered
the tides; allowing every objection against it, old Putney Bridge was
infinitely more interesting than the present one of stone that sits so low
in the water and offends the eye with its matter-of-fact regularity,
proclaiming fat contracts and the unsympathetic baldness of outline
characteristic of the engineer's most admired efforts.
Perhaps an artist sees beauty where less privileged people discover only
ugliness; how else shall I account for the singular preference of the
guide-book, in which I read that "the ugly wooden bridge was replaced in
1886 by an elegant granite structure"?
[Illustration: THE REVELLERS.]
Old Putney Bridge could never have been anything else than picturesque,
from the date of its opening, in 1729, to its final demolition twelve
years ago: the new bridge will never be less than ugly and formal, and an
eyesore in the broad reach that was spanned so finely by the old timber
structure for over a hundred and fifty years. The toll for one person
walking across the bridge was but a halfpenny, but it frequently happened
in the old days that people had not even that small coin to pay their
passage, and in such cases it was the recognized custom for the tollman to
take their hats for security. The old gatekeepers of Putney Bridge were
provided with impressive-looking gowns and wore something the appearance
of beadles. Also they were provided with stout staves, which frequently
came in useful during the rows which were continually occurring upon the
occasions when wayfarers had their hats snatched off. "Your halfpenny or
your hat" was an offensive cry, and, together with the scuffles with
strayed revellers, left little peace to the guardians of the bridge.
[Sidenote: _SUBURBS_]
Everything is altered here since the old coaching-days; everything, that
is to say, but the course of the river and the trim churches of Fulham and
Putney, whose towers rise in rivalry from either shore. And Putney
church-tower is altogether dwarfed by the huge public-house that stands
opposite: a flaunting insult scarcely less flagrant than the shame put
upon the House of God by Cromwell and his fellows who sate in council of
war in the chancel, and discussed battles and schemed strife and bloodshed
over the table sacred to the Lord's Communion. Putney has suffered from
its nearness to London. Where, until ten years ago, old mansions and
equally old shops lined its steep High Street, there are now only rows of
pretentious frontages occupied by up-to-date butchers and bakers and
candlestick-makers; by drapers, milliners, and "stores" of the suburban,
or five miles radius, variety. Gone is "Fairfax House," most impressive
and dignified of suburban mansions, dating from the time of James I., and
sometime the headquarters of the "Army of God and the Parliament"; gone,
too, is Gibbon's birthplace, and the very church is partly
rebuilt--although _that_ is a crime of which our forebears of 1836 are
guilty. It is guilt, you will allow, who stand on the bridge and look down
upon the mean exterior brick walls of the nave, worse still by comparison
with the rough, weathered stones of the old tower. Every part of the
church was rebuilt then, except that tower, and though the Perpendicular
nave-arcade was set up again, it has been scraped and painted to a newness
that seems quite of a piece with other "improvements." All the monuments,
too, were moved into fresh places when the general post of that
sixty-years-old "restoration" was in progress. The dainty chantry of that
notable native of Putney, Bishop West, who died in 1533, was removed from
the south aisle to the chancel, and the ornate monument to Richard Lussher
placed in the tower, as one enters the church from the street.
Richard Lussher was not a remarkable man, or if he was the memory of his
extraordinary qualities has not been handed down to us. But if he was not
remarkable, his epitaph is, as you shall judge:--
"Memoriae Sacrum.
"Here lyeth y{e} body of Ric: Lussher of Puttney in y{e} Conty of
Surey, Esq: who married Mary, y{e} second daughter of George Scott of
Staplefoord, tanner, in y{e} Conty of Essex, Esq: he departed y{s}
lyfe y{e} 27{th} of September, An{o}o 1618. Aetatis sue 30.
"What tounge can speake y{e} Vertues of y{s} Creature?
Whose body fayre, whose soule of rarer feature;
He livd a Saynt, he dyed an holy wight,
In Heaven on earth a Joyfull heavy sight.
Body, Soule united, agreed in one.
Lyke strings well tuned in an unison,
No discord harsh y{s} navell could untye.
'Twas Heauen y{e} earth y{s} musick did envye;
Wherefore may well be sayd he lived well,
& being dead, y{e} World his vertues tell."
Some scornful commentator has called this doggerel; but I would that all
doggerel were as interesting.
[Sidenote: _HISTORIC FIGURES_]
We have already heard of one Cromwell at Putney, but another of the same
name, Thomas Cromwell,--almost as great a figure in the history of England
as "His Highness" the Protector,--was born here, a good deal over a
hundred years before warty-faced Oliver came and set his men in array
against the King's forces from Oxford. Thomas was the son of a blacksmith
whose forge stood somewhere in the neighbourhood of the Wandsworth Road,
on a site now lost; but though of such humble origin he rose to be a
successor of Wolsey, that romantic figure whom we shall meet lower down
the road, at Esher, who himself was of equally lowly birth, being but the
son of a butcher. But while Wolsey,--that "butcher's dogge," as some
jealous contemporary called him,--rendered much service to the Church,
Cromwell, like his namesake, had a genius for destruction, and became a
veritable _malleus ecclesia_. He it was who, unscrupulous and servile in
attendance upon the King's freaks, unctuous in flatteries of that Royal
paragon of vanity, sought and obtained the Chancellorship of England, by
suggesting that Henry should solve all his difficulties with Rome by
establishing a national Church of which he should be head. No surer way of
rising to the kingly favour could have been devised. Henry listened to his
adviser and took his advice, and Thomas Cromwell rose immediately to the
highest pinnacle of power, a lofty altitude which in those times often
turned men giddy and lost them their heads, in no figurative sense. None
so bitter and implacable towards an old faith than those who, having once
held it, have from one reason or another embraced new views; and Cromwell
was no exception from this rule. He was most zealous and industrious in
the work of disestablishing the religious houses, and the most rapacious
in securing a goodly share of the spoils. He was a terror to the homeless
monks and religious brethren whom his untiring industry had sent to beg
their bread upon the roads, and "fierce laws, fiercely executed--an
unflinching resolution which neither danger could daunt nor saintly virtue
move to mercy--a long list of solemn tragedies weigh upon his memory."
But these topmost platforms were craggy places in Henry VIII.'s time, and
the occupants of such dizzy heights fell frequently with a crash that was
all the greater from the depth of their fall. Wolsey had been more than
usually fortunate in his disgrace, for he was ill, and died from natural
causes. When his immediate successor, Sir Thomas More, fell, his life was
taken upon Tower Green. "_Decollat_," says a contemporary document, with a
grim succinctness, "_in castrum Londin: vulgo turris appellatur_."
Indeed, this was the common end of all them that walked arm-in-arm with
the King, and could have at one time boasted his friendship in the
historic phrase, "_Ego et Rex meus_." Why, the boast was a sure augury of
disaster. Wolsey found it so, and so also did More; and now Cromwell was
to follow More to the block. That his head fell amid protestations of his
belief in the Catholic faith is a singular comment upon the conduct of his
life, which was chiefly passed in violent persecutions of its ministers.
[Sidenote: _GIBBON_]
Another famous man was born at Putney: Edward Gibbon, the historian. Him
also we shall meet at another part of the road, but we may halt awhile to
hear some personal gossip at Putney, although it would be vain to seek his
birthplace to-day.
He says, in his posthumously-published "Memoirs of My Life and Writings":
"I was born at Putney, the 27th of April, O.S., in the year one thousand
seven hundred and twenty-seven; the first child of the marriage of Edward
Gibbon, Esq., and of Judith Porten. My lot might have been that of a
slave, a savage, or a peasant; nor can I reflect without pleasure on the
bounty of Nature, which cast my birth in a free and civilized country, in
an age of science and philosophy, in a family of honourable rank, and
decently endowed with the gifts of fortune. From my birth I have enjoyed
the rights of primogeniture; but I was succeeded by five brothers and one
sister, all of whom were snatched away in their infancy. My five brothers,
whose names may be found in the parish register of Putney, I shall not
pretend to lament.... In my ninth year," he continues, "in a lucid
interval of comparative health, my father adopted the convenient and
customary mode of English education; and I was sent to
Kingston-upon-Thames, to a school of about seventy boys, which was kept by
a Doctor Wooddeson and his assistants. Every time I have since passed over
Putney Common, I have always noticed the spot where my mother, as we drove
along in the coach, admonished me that I was now going into the world, and
must learn to think and act for myself."
At that time of writing he had "not forgotten how often in the year '46 I
was reviled and buffetted for the sins of my Tory ancestors." At length,
"by the common methods of discipline, at the expence of many tears and
some blood, I purchased the knowledge of the Latin syntax; and, not long
since, I was possessed of the dirty volumes of Phaedrus and Cornelius
Nepos, which I painfully construed and darkly understood."
Gibbon's "Miscellaneous Works," published after his death, are prefaced by
a silhouette portrait, cut in 1794 by a Mrs. Brown, and reproduced here.
Lord Sheffield, who edited the volume, remarks that "the extraordinary
talents of this lady have furnished as complete a likeness of Mr. Gibbon,
as to person, face, and manner, as can be conceived; yet it was done in
his absence." By this counterfeit presentment we see that the author of
the "Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire" was possessed of a singular
personality, curiously out of keeping with his stately and majestic
periods.
[Illustration: EDWARD GIBBON.]
This is how Gibbon's personal appearance struck one of his
contemporaries--that brilliant Irishman, Malone:--
"Independent of his literary merit, as a companion Gibbon was uncommonly
agreeable. He had an immense fund of anecdote and of erudition of various
kinds, both ancient and modern, and had acquired such a facility and
elegance of talk that I had always great pleasure in listening to him. The
manner and voice, though they were peculiar, and I believe artificial at
first, did not at all offend, for they had become so appropriated as to
appear natural. His indolence and inattention and ignorance about his own
state are scarce credible. He had for five-and-twenty years a hydrocele,
and the swelling at length was so large that he quite straddled in his
walk; yet he never sought for any advice or mentioned it to his most
intimate friend, Lord Sheffield, and two or three days before he died very
gravely asked Lord Spencer and him whether they had perceived his malady.
The answer could only be, 'Had we eyes?' He thought, he said, when he was
at Althorp last Christmas, the ladies looked a little oddly. The fact is
that poor Gibbon, strange as it may seem, imagined himself well-looking,
and his first motion in a mixed company of ladies and gentlemen was to the
fireplace, against which he planted his back, and then, taking out his
snuff-box, began to hold forth. In his late unhappy situation it was not
easy for the ladies to find out where they could direct their eyes with
safety, for in addition to the hydrocele it appeared after his death that
he had a rupture, and it was perfectly a miracle how he had lived for some
time past, his stomach being entirely out of its natural position."
For other memories of Gibbon we must wait until we reach his ancestral
acres of Buriton, near Petersfield, and meanwhile, we have come to the
hill-brow, where the new route and the old meet, and the Portsmouth Road
definitely begins.
There are many other memories at Putney; too many, in fact, to linger
over, if we wish to come betimes to the dockyard town that is our
destination.
[Sidenote: _THEODORE HOOK_]
So no more than a mention of Theodore Hook, who lived in a little house on
the Fulham side of Putney Bridge, which was visited by Barham (dear,
genial Tom Ingoldsby!) while rowing up the Thames one fine day. Hook was
absent, and Barham wrote some impromptu verses in the hall, beginning--
"Why, gadzooks! here's Theodore Hook's,
Who's the author of so many humorous books!"
But the author of those books was the author also of many practical jokes,
of which the Berners Street Hoax is still the undisputed classic. But that
monumental piece of foolery is not more laughable than the jape he put
upon the Putney inn-keeper (I think he was the landlord of the old "White
Lion").
He called one day at that house and ordered an excellent dinner, with wine
and all manner of delicacies for one, and having finished his meal and
made himself particularly agreeable to the host (who by some singular
chance did not know his guest), he suddenly asked him if he would like to
know how to be able to draw both old and mild ale from the same barrel. Of
course he would! "Then," said Hook, "I'll show you, if you will take me
down to your cellar, and will promise never to divulge the secret." The
landlord promised. "Then," said the guest, "bring a gimlet with you, and
we'll proceed to work." When they had reached the cellar the landlord
pointed out a barrel of mild ale, and the stranger bored a hole in one
side with the gimlet. "Now, landlord," said he, "put your finger over the
hole while I bore the other side." The second hole having been bored, it
was stopped, in the same way, by the landlord's finger. "And now," said
the stranger, "where's a glass? Didn't you bring one?" "No," said mine
host. "But you'll find one up-stairs," replied the guest. "Yes; but I
can't leave the barrel, or all the ale will run away," rejoined the
landlord. "No matter," exclaimed the stranger, "I'll go for you," and ran
up the cellar steps for one. Meanwhile, the landlord waited patiently,
embracing the barrel, for five minutes--ten minutes--a quarter of an hour,
and then began to shout for the other to make haste, as he was getting the
cramp. His shouts at length brought--not the stranger--but his own wife.
"Well, where's the glass? where's the gentleman?" said he. "What, the
gentleman who came down here with you?" "Yes." "Oh, he went off a quarter
of an hour ago. What a pleasant-spoken gent----" "What!" cried the
landlord, aghast, "what did he say?" "Why," said his spouse, after
considering a moment, "he said you had been letting him into the mysteries
of the cellar." "Letting _him_ in," yelled the landlord, in a rage,
"letting _him_ in! Why, confound it, woman, he let _me_ in--he's never
paid for the dinner, wine, or anything."
When Hook subsequently called upon the landlord and settled his bill, it
is said that he and his victim had a good laugh over the affair, but if
that tale is true, that landlord must have been a very forgiving man.
IV
Let us now turn our attention to the original route to Portsmouth; the
road between the Stone's End, Borough, and Wandsworth. I warrant we shall
find it much more interesting than going from the West-end coach-offices
with the fashionables; for they were more varied crowds that assembled
round the old "Elephant and Castle" than were any of the coach-loads from
the "Cross Keys," Cheapside, or from that other old inn of coaching
memories, the "Golden Cross," Charing Cross.
[Illustration: OLD "ELEPHANT AND CASTLE," 1824.]
[Sidenote: _AN UNCONSIDERED TRIFLE_]
Every one journeyed from the "Elephant and Castle" in the old stage-coach
days, before the mails were introduced, and this well-known house early
became famous. It was about 1670 that the first inn bearing this sign
was erected here, on a piece of waste ground that, although situated so
near the borders of busy Southwark, had been, up to the time of Cromwell
and the era of the Commonwealth, quite an unconsidered and worthless plot
of ground, at one period the practising-ground for archers,--hence the
neighbouring title of Newington Butts,--but then barren of everything but
the potsherds and general refuse of neighbouring London. In 1658, some
one, willing to be generous at inconsiderable cost, gave this Place of
Desolation towards the maintenance of the poor of Newington; and it is to
be hoped that the poor derived much benefit from the gift. I am, however,
not very sure that they found their condition much improved by such
generosity. Fifteen years later, things wore a different complexion, for
when we hear of the gift being confirmed in 1673, and that the premises of
the "Elephant and Castle" inn were but recently built, the prospects of
the poor seem to be improving in some slight degree. Documents of this
period put the rent of this piece of waste at L5 _per annum_! and this
amount had only risen to L8 10_s._ in the space of a hundred years. But so
rapidly did the value of land now rise, that in 1776 a lease was granted
at the yearly rent of L100; and fourteen years later a renewal was
effected for twenty-one years at L190.
The poor of Newington should have been in excellent case by this time,
unless, indeed, their numbers increased with the times. And certainly the
neighbourhood had now grown by prodigious leaps and bounds, and Newington
Butts had now become a busy coaching centre. How rapidly the value of land
had increased about this time may be judged from the results of the
auction held upon the expiration of the lease in 1811. The whole of the
estate was put up for auction in four lots, and a certain Jane Fisher
became tenant of "the house called the 'Elephant and Castle,' used as a
public-house," for a term of thirty-one years, at the enormously increased
rent of L405, and an immediate outlay of L1200. The whole estate realized
L623 a year. As shown by a return of charities, printed for the House of
Commons in 1868, the "Elephant and Castle" Charity, including fourteen
houses and an investment in Government stock, yielded at that time an
annual income of L1453 10_s._ 0_d._
[Sidenote: _THE 'ELEPHANT AND CASTLE'_]
The two old views of the "Elephant and Castle" reproduced here, show the
relative importance of the place at different periods. The first was in
existence until 1824, and the larger house was built two years later. A
dreadful relic of the barbarous practice by which suicides were buried in
the highways, at the crossing of the roads, was discovered, some few years
since, under the roadway opposite the "Elephant and Castle," during the
progress of some alterations in the paving. The mutilated skeleton of a
girl was found, which had apparently been in that place for considerably
over a hundred years. Local gossips at once rushed to the conclusion that
this had been some undiscovered murder, but the registers of St. George's
Church, Southwark, probably afford a clue to the mystery. The significant
entry occurs--"1666: Abigall Smith, poisoned herself: buried in the
highway neere the Fishmongers' Almshouses."
No one has come forward to explain the reason of this particular sign
being selected. "Y{t} is call'd y{e} Elephaunt and Castell," says an old
writer, "and this is y{e} cognizaunce of y{e} Cotelers, as appeareth
likewise off y{e} Bell Savage by Lud Gate;" but this was never the
property of the Cutlers' Company, while the site of "Belle Sauvage" is
still theirs, and is marked by an old carved stone, bearing the initials
"J. A.," with a jocular-looking elephant pawing the ground and carrying a
castle.
When the first "Elephant and Castle" was built on this site, the land to
the westward as far as Lambeth and Kennington was quite rustic, and
remained almost entirely open until the end of last century. Lambeth and
Kennington were both villages, difficult of access except by water, and
this tract of ground, now covered with the crowded houses of an old
suburb, was known as St. George's Fields. It was low and flat, and was
traversed by broad ditches, generally full of stagnant water. Roman and
British remains have been found here, and it seems likely that some
prehistoric fighting was performed on this site, but as all this took
place a very long while before the Portsmouth Road was thought of, I shall
not propose to go back to the days of Ostorius Scapula or of Boadicea to
determine the facts. Instead, I will pass over the centuries until the
times of King James I., when there stood in the midst of St. George's
Fields, and on the site of Bethlehem Hospital, a disreputable tavern
known as the "Dog and Duck," at which no good young man of that period who
held his reputation dear would have been seen for worlds.
[Illustration: "DOG AND DUCK" TAVERN.]
There still remains, let into the boundary-wall of "Bedlam," the old stone
sign of the "Dog and Duck," divided into two compartments; one showing a
dog holding what is intended for a duck in his mouth, while the other
bears the badge of the Bridge House Estate, pointing to the fact that the
property belonged to that corporation. Duck-hunting was the chiefest
amusement here, and was carried on before a company the very reverse of
select in the grounds attached to the tavern, where a lake and rustic
arbours preceded the establishment of Rosherville.
At later periods St. George's Fields were the scene of "Wilkes and
Liberty" riots, and of the lively proceedings of Lord George Gordon's "No
Popery" enthusiasts. It is by a singular irony that upon the very spot
where forty thousand rabid Protestants assembled in 1780 to wreak their
vengeance upon the Catholics of London, there stands to-day the Roman
Catholic cathedral of St. George.
[Illustration: SIGN OF THE "DOG AND DUCK."]
[Sidenote: _THE ROADS_]
This event brings us to the threshold of the coaching era, for in 1784,
four years after the Gordon Riots, mail-coaches were introduced, and the
roads were set in order. Years before, when only the slow stages were
running, a journey from London to Portsmouth occupied fourteen hours, _if
the roads were good_! Nothing is said of the time consumed on the way in
the other contingency; but we may pluck a phrase from a public
announcement towards the end of the seventeenth century that seems to hint
at dangers and problematical arrivals. "Ye 'Portsmouth Machine' sets out
from ye Elephant and Castell, and arrives presently _by the Grace of
God...._" In those days men did well to trust to grace, considering the
condition of the roads; but in more recent times coach-proprietors put
their trust in their cattle and McAdam, and dropped the piety.