The Royal Mail: Its Curiosities and RomanceHyde, James Wilson
History
The Royal Mail: Its Curiosities and Romance
Hyde, James Wilson
Postal service -- Great Britain
"The Brighton mail (from London) reached Crawley, but was compelled to
return. The Dover mail also returned, not being able to proceed farther
than Gravesend. The Hastings mail was also obliged to return. The
Brighton up-mail of Sunday had travelled about eight miles from that
town, when it fell into a drift of snow, from which it was impossible to
extricate it without further assistance. The guard immediately set off
to obtain all necessary aid; but when he returned, no trace whatever
could be found either of the coach, coachman, or passengers, three in
number. After much difficulty the coach was found, but could not be
extricated from the hollow into which it had got. The guard did not
reach town until seven o'clock on Tuesday night, having been obliged to
travel with the bags on horseback, and in many instances to leave the
main road and proceed across fields, in order to avoid the deep drifts
of snow."
"The Bath and Bristol mails, due on Tuesday morning, were abandoned
eighty miles from London, and the mail-bags brought up in a
postchaise-and-four by the two guards, who reached London at six o'clock
on Wednesday morning. For seventeen miles of the distance they had to
come across fields."
"The Manchester down-mail reached St Albans, and getting off the road
into a hollow, was upset. The guard returned to London in a post-chaise
and four horses with the bags and passengers."
"About a mile from St Albans, on the London side, a chariot without
horses was seen on Tuesday nearly buried in the snow. There were two
ladies inside, who made an earnest appeal to the mail-guard, whose
coach had got into a drift nearly at the same spot. The ladies said the
postboy had left them to go to St Albans to get fresh cattle, and had
been gone two hours. The guard was unable to assist them, and his mail
being extracted, he pursued his journey for London, leaving the chariot
and ladies in the situation where they were first seen."
"The Devonport mail arrived at half-past eleven o'clock. The guard, who
had travelled with it from Ilminster, a distance of 140 miles, states
that journey to have been a most trying one to both men and cattle. The
storm commenced when they reached Wincanton, and never afterwards
ceased. The wind blew fresh, and the snow and sleet in crossing
Salisbury Plain were driving into their faces so as almost to blind
them. Between Andover and Whitchurch the mail was stuck fast in a
snowdrift, and the horses, in attempting to get out, were nearly buried.
The coachman got down, and almost disappeared in the drift upon which he
alighted. Fortunately, at this juncture, a waggon with four horses came
up, and by unyoking these from the waggon and attaching them to the
mail, it was got out of the hollow in which it was sunk."
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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