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authorRoger Frank <rfrank@pglaf.org>2025-10-14 19:00:43 -0700
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+The Project Gutenberg eBook, Notes on Old Peterborough, by Andrew Percival
+
+
+This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with
+almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or
+re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included
+with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org
+
+
+
+
+
+Title: Notes on Old Peterborough
+
+
+Author: Andrew Percival
+
+
+
+Release Date: March 5, 2014 [eBook #45059]
+
+Language: English
+
+Character set encoding: UTF-8
+
+
+***START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK NOTES ON OLD PETERBOROUGH***
+
+
+Transcribed from the 1905 Geo. C. Caster edition by David Price, email
+ccx074@pglaf.org
+
+ [Picture: Andrew Percival (Taken in the year 1901)]
+
+ May be had bound in Cloth, Price 1/6.
+
+ * * * * *
+
+
+
+
+
+ Notes on
+ Old Peterborough,
+
+
+ BY
+ ANDREW PERCIVAL, S.S.C.,
+
+ With Eight Illustrations,
+
+ INCLUDING
+
+ Portrait of the Author.
+
+ Arranged, Published, and Sold by Special Permission
+ of the Author,
+
+ BY
+ The PETERBOROUGH ARCHÆOLOGICAL SOCIETY.
+
+ [Picture: Decorative graphic]
+
+ ONE SHILLING.
+
+ [Picture: Decorative graphic]
+
+ PETERBOROUGH:
+ GEO. C. CASTER, MARKET PLACE.
+ 1905.
+
+ [_Reprinted from type of the_ “_Peterborough Advertiser_.”]
+
+
+
+
+PREFACE.
+
+
+The Reminiscences of a Citizen whose memory goes back in detail for over
+Seventy Years, as in the case of the Contributor of these Notes, cannot
+fail to be of paramount interest and of antiquarian value. Especially in
+this case, where the distinguished Narrator has held a very foremost
+place in the Professional life and Voluntary Public Service of the City.
+Additionally interesting must they prove in the case of a City which has
+developed from a comparatively small parish into a populous industrial,
+commercial and residential Centre. The Peterborough Archæological
+Society has in these circumstances undertaken the duty of preserving and
+circulating in compact form the very valuable personal Recollections of
+Mr. Andrew Percival. In doing so the Society acknowledges its
+indebtedness to that gentleman for his ready permission to entrust them
+to its charge. The writer of this Preface was present at the old
+Wentworth Rooms, at Peterborough, in the years 1883–4, when the addresses
+which formed the basis of this chronicle were delivered. He thus felt a
+continuity of interest when the manuscript was recently committed to him
+to prepare, with illustrations, for advance publication in the
+“Peterborough Advertiser,” in September, 1905, and in bringing up to
+date, during the indisposition of the Author, several of the
+chronological and statistical references. Otherwise the Notes remain
+exactly as set down and corrected by Mr. Percival. The Society expresses
+its thanks to Mr. A. C. Taylor for the use of the very excellent photo of
+Mr. Percival which forms the frontispiece; to Mr. T. N. Green (Ball &
+Co.) for the Photo of the Old Bridge; and to Mr. Geo. C. Caster for the
+use of “Whittlesey Mere” block, from “Fenland Notes & Queries”; most of
+the others having been specially taken and engraved for this Publication.
+
+ F. L.
+
+_Peterborough_, _Oct._, _1905_.
+
+
+
+
+INDEX.
+
+
+LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS. {5}
+
+Portrait of Mr. Andrew Percival Title Page
+Peterborough Market Place in 1836 9
+Sedan Chair 19
+Cottages in Paston 20
+The Old Bridge over the Nene 27
+Sexton Barns 29
+Peterborough Market Place in 1795 36
+Map of Whittlesey Mere 47
+
+ * * * * *
+
+ PAGE.
+Advertisement, A peculiar 40
+An Alibi 43
+
+Balls 19
+Barns 29, 31
+Beacon, A lighted 22
+Beadle, The City 16
+Breweries 10
+Bridge, The old wooden 27
+Buckle’s Brewery 10, 11
+Burglaries 43
+Burial at Cross Roads 32
+Burial Ground, The Old 34
+Butcher’s Piece, The 41
+
+Cabbage Row 31
+Calculating Boy 10
+Castor, Old system of farming at 22
+Cattle Market 33
+Cemetery, The 34
+Coaches, Mail 11, 12, 13
+Constables, Parish 17
+Contrast, A 13
+Cost of Travelling 12
+
+Distemper, The 40
+Draining the Great Level 23
+
+Epitaphs 35
+Executions 41
+Extraordinary Medley 34
+
+Fairs 19
+Fen around Peterborough 23
+Fen Drainage 23, 25
+Fen Taxes 27
+Franking Letters 16
+Frisby’s Feat 12
+Frog Hall 32
+
+Gaols 17, 30
+Gas Works started 32
+Gates, Toll 9
+God’s Acre 34
+Guildhall, The 41
+
+Hangings 41
+Hostelry, The Thorpe Road 30
+
+Infirmary, The 10
+Intelligent Fenmen 27
+
+Jaunt through the City 29
+
+Ladies and the Cattle 33
+Land, Improvement in value of 27
+Level, The Great 23
+Level, Draining the Great 23
+Lock-up Story 43
+
+Mail Coaches 11
+Market, Cattle 33
+,, The old 33
+„ Wednesday 34
+Mere, Whittlesey 19
+Mill, The Old 14, 27, 29
+Mill system of Draining 25
+Mud Case, The 44
+
+Nene Outfall, The 25
+Newspapers 38, 39, 40
+Newtown 31
+Notorious Family, A 17
+
+Oasis in the Desert 21
+
+Packets, River 15
+Parish Constables 17
+Paston 22
+Ponds 31
+Poor House 31
+Poor Law 30
+Post Office 37
+Postal Charges 15
+
+Railways 11, 14, 44
+Railways and Earl Fitzwilliam 14
+Retrospective 45
+River Packets 15
+Robbery at the Vicarage 43
+
+Sedan Chairs 19
+Sexton Barns 29
+Smothering the Cathedral 14
+Snatched from the Sea 25
+
+Tales of the Coaching days 12
+Theatre 17
+Toll Gates 9
+Tombstone Rhymes 35
+Tythe Barn, Boroughbury 31
+
+Value of land improved 27
+
+Whalley, Mr. G. H. 15
+Whittlesey Mere 19
+
+
+
+
+PART THE FIRST.
+
+
+CITY TOLL GATES.—HOW TOLL WAS LEVIED.—THE INFIRMARY.—OLD CITY
+BREWERIES.—THE CALCULATING BOY.—STARTING THE RAILWAYS.—FRISBY’S
+FEAT.—TALES OF THE COACHING DAYS.—TALLY-HO COACH.—A CONTRAST.—A STORY OF
+LORD FITZWILLIAM.—SMOTHERING THE CATHEDRAL.—THE OLD MILL.—SIMPSON’S
+PACKET.—MR. WHALLEY’S JOKE.—POSTAL CHARGES.—FRANKING LETTERS.—THE CITY
+BEADLE.—PARISH CONSTABLES AND GAOL.—A NOTORIOUS FAMILY.—FAIRS.—CITY
+BELLS.—SEDAN CHAIRS.—WHITTLESEY MERE.
+
+WHEN I came to Peterboro’ in Oct., 1833, I think our population was five
+or six thousand. In the month of August I came down to make arrangements
+for my being articled to the late Mr. Gates. I was taken charge of by my
+father, and protected by my sister, and we drove from Northampton, where
+my father was a medical man having an extensive practice, and could only
+spare one day. During the night a most extraordinary storm sprang up.
+We had to go back during that storm. There was an enormous destruction
+of timber on the road between here and Northampton, and in many other
+parts of the country. It was a storm such as very seldom rages in these
+latitudes in the summer months. In one part of the journey was a great
+avenue of trees, a considerable portion of which was destroyed. It was
+the property of a worthy squire, and I remember hearing it remarked, “How
+much Mr. So-and-So will feel the destruction of his avenue.” “Oh dear
+no,” said the person spoken to, “don’t you know that that property is
+settled property, and he has no power of cutting timber, and he will be
+highly delighted. He thinks the avenue is much improved, as it puts a
+very good sum of money into his pocket, which is very welcome to him.”
+You see it is an ill wind that blows nobody good.
+
+[Picture: Peterborough Market Place in the Coaching Days. (From a Print,
+ 1836). “Peterborough has much altered since those days.”—Andrew
+ Percival]
+
+When I got here, the first thing I saw when I looked round the town was
+that it was confined by toll bars. There was a toll bar just over the
+bridge, where the little house since converted into shops then was. At
+the other end of the town, on the Lincoln Road, was another toll bar; on
+the Thorney Road was another, and at the back of Westgate another. Our
+town had four gates drawn across the four entrances; on the road now
+known as Lincoln Road East, then Crawthorne Lane, there was a side bar to
+prevent anyone getting out of the town without paying contributions. One
+enquired what these meant, because within a mile or two on each of the
+main roads you would find another toll bar, at which they duly took toll,
+and the only villages that could get into Peterborough without paying
+toll were Yaxley, Farcet, and Stanground, as the turnpike road toll on
+that road, the old London Road, was near Norman Cross. Otherwise, our
+system was so ingeniously contrived that you could not get into or out of
+Peterborough without paying town toll at the end of the street, which
+were tolls for the pavement. This was rather a peculiar system. I do
+not wish to quote Scripture, but you will recollect the enquiry, “Of whom
+do the Kings of the earth take tribute? Of their own children or of
+strangers, and they said ‘of strangers.’ Then the comment was ‘Then are
+the children free!’”
+
+The system that our forefathers adopted for encouraging communication and
+traffic was this: They put a toll on for their pavements, from the
+payment of which they exempted themselves, and took it from the strangers
+that came into the place. The only exceptions were when the inhabitants
+of the place travelled on Sundays. Toll collectors were then authorised
+to take toll from them, and also from those who hired vehicles in the
+place, the result being if you were an inhabitant of the place, and had
+the luck to keep your carriage or gig or wagon, or whatever it was, you
+might use the pavement as much as you pleased, and pay nothing. But if
+you were a poor person, or could only treat yourself occasionally with
+the luxury of a gig, or were obliged to hire a trap for business, yon
+were immediately taken toll of.
+
+The present Hospital or Infirmary was then a private dwelling-house. The
+Dispensary which existed then was a small house opposite the Old Burial
+Ground, the one now occupied by Mr. Payling, the dentist. After some
+years, it was removed from this place to what is now the Police Station
+in Newtown. Soon after this, the Earl Fitzwilliam purchased the present
+building and presented it to the City, a monument of his appreciation of
+the good that had been done in a small way by the existing buildings, and
+which, I think, in the present arrangements, fully carried out his
+Lordship’s benevolent wishes.
+
+There were two considerable features of Peterborough which have entirely
+disappeared. Where Queen Street and North Street now stand were two
+large breweries, known as Buckle’s Brewery and Squires’s Brewery. They
+were quite institutions of the place, and it always strikes me as a very
+strange thing that they should have entirely disappeared, as one of them
+would have been larger than all the breweries now in Peterborough.
+Buckles’ Brewery was certainly a very remarkable one, and carried on with
+great energy and spirit. There was one peculiarity they had—that some
+friends of the partners could assemble on Easter Monday and spend the
+afternoon in playing at marbles. I have spent pleasant afternoons there
+on Easter Mondays. There were two large tuns or barrels in which the
+beer was kept, one of which was called Mrs. Clarke, and the other the
+Duke of York, to perpetuate a scandal at the time when they were
+constructed. A very hospitable time always followed the game at marbles.
+
+Buckles’ Brewery was the cause of another peculiar circumstance. On one
+occasion there visited the town for the amusement of the people, a
+calculating boy. He went through, his entertainment with great success,
+and at last one of our worthy inhabitants got up and asked the question
+“How many gallons does Mr. Buckles’ great copper hold?” The boy said he
+could not tell. “No; I thought you could not,” was the reply. Our
+worthy citizen had forgotten to give the dimensions of the copper, and
+went away rejoicing over the fact that he had puzzled the calculating
+boy!
+
+He reminds me very much of a story one has heard in connection with our
+own professional experience. A witness was called to prove an assault,
+which consisted in a man having been knocked down by a stone thrown at
+him. The counsel was anxious to ascertain the size of the stone. The
+witness said “do you want to know how big it was?” “Yes,” said the
+counsel. “The size do you mean?” “Yes.” “Well, it was biggish.”
+“Well, I want you to tell me how big it was”! “Well, sir, if you want me
+to tell you how big it was, I should think it was as big as a lump o’
+chalk.” Now, I think the gentleman who put the question about the
+copper, and the witness, must have been very nearly related.
+
+When I arrived in the City, it became very important to me to know how I
+could get away from it. I lived at Northampton. Between Peterborough
+and Northampton there are now eleven trains a day. When I came to
+Peterborough in 1833, and for some years afterwards, the only
+communication between the town of Northampton and the City of
+Peterborough was a one-horse carrier’s cart, which came twice a week, and
+I think the large proportion of its business consisted in carrying
+parcels from the Probate Office at Northampton to the Probate Office at
+Peterborough. For coaches we were pretty well off. Two mails ran
+through Peterborough, the Boston Coach, and the Coach to Hull. We used
+to go shares with the town of Stamford with a London Coach. One of our
+townsmen ran a coach to Stilton daily, where it joined the coach from
+Stamford. At one time that coach carried the letter bag, and on one
+occasion it started without the bag.
+
+There was a man known as “Old John Frisby,” who was not quite “all
+there,” and this man went after the coach with the letter bag, and
+overtook it at Stilton. The poor man was under the impression that he
+had done the State a great service and thought he ought to receive a
+pension, and he daily expected it until his death.
+
+The Mail Coaches were very comfortable for travelling in fine weather,
+and an eight or ten hours’ journey was very pleasant, providing you did
+not ride inside. A journey to London and Edinburgh occupied two whole
+days and nights. The expense of such a mode of travelling was very
+great, being five or six times as much as the ordinary first class
+railway fare. Every fifty or sixty miles the Coachman would touch his
+hat and say, “I leave you here, sir,” which meant that you were to give
+him a fee. The guard would do the same, and when your luggage was put
+up, the ostler came to you. If you travelled post or in “a yellow and
+two,” as it was called, you had to pay 1s. 6d. a mile, beside the toll
+bars, and 3d. a mile for the post boy, as well as something more that he
+always expected. The 3d. a mile for the post boy, as his regular fee, is
+about equal to the highest first class railway fare that is paid on any
+railway in the country.
+
+Just conceive what a change there is in the communication and you do not
+wonder that the introduction of the railway system has made a stationary
+nation into a nation of travellers. After a time things did improve a
+little. The Birmingham Railway was made at considerable cost. When I
+wanted to go to Northampton, for many years I had to get up at six
+o’clock in the morning, hire a gig to go to Thrapston, where I caught the
+Cambridge coach, which ran in connection with the coach at Oxford. It
+cost about £4 to go home and come back again. When the Blisworth railway
+was opened, a coach was set up from Lynn to Blisworth six days in the
+week. This was a great convenience, and was very well supported. There
+were two coachmen. One was very grave and serious and the other light
+and frivolous. Everybody knew them very well indeed. It was very
+amusing to travel with them.
+
+At last, the Northampton Railway was projected, and it was plain to those
+men that their reign was coming to an end; but they used to endeavour to
+convert you to the belief that it was far better for things to remain as
+they were. The light and frivolous one used to sing a song in praise of
+the “Tally Ho” Coach. I remember the chorus was:
+
+ Let the steam pot hiss
+ Until it is hot.
+ Give me the speed of
+ The Tally-ho trot!
+
+The other coachman used to appeal to your fears, and say how dreadful it
+was when a railway accident occurred—“when an accident occurred to the
+coach—there you are! Just fancy an accident at 20 or 30 miles an hour;
+when that happens, where are you?”
+
+Well, we have survived it, and I am not sure that he was accurate in his
+per centage of those injured in coach and railway accidents. I have
+known some very fatal and distressing accidents bearing a very large
+proportion of injuries and deaths to those in the coach. I may mention
+that the Lynn coach of Messrs. Hill was very good to take you to the sea,
+it was very hard work to get to the beach in these days. I believe
+Skegness consisted of a single house. The nearest place was Yarmouth,
+and Messrs. Hill’s car took you to Lynn, where you could join the
+Birmingham and Yarmouth mail. I have never forgotten my first visit to
+Yarmouth when a boy. From the Norwich Road you caught the first view of
+the sea. As you enter Yarmouth now by rail you go in over the marshes,
+and the last two or three miles are by the side of muddy water, and you
+cannot see the sea until you get on the beach. The contrast between the
+way by the old coach and by the rail is very striking, indeed.
+
+In the year 1842 or 1843 it was rumoured that the London and
+North-Western Company were about to feel their way eastward, and the
+project for making the Peterborough and Northampton Railway was put into
+shape. Our wildest dreams never expected a railway. We had a coach, and
+that was quite a novelty. The Bishop and Dean and Chapter had a good
+deal of property on the line, and strongly opposed the railway. When the
+Bill came into the House of Lords it was, to our great delight, passed by
+a majority of One. There is an anecdote of Lord Fitzwilliam, who was an
+opponent of the Bill. That one day his Lordship was coming down by
+train, and in the same carriage was one of those gentlemen who knew
+everything. This gentleman was giving to a friend a history of the line,
+and when passing Alwalton Lynch said: “That is the road to Milton Park,
+and do you know that Lord Fitzwilliam opposed the Bill because they would
+not make him a station there?” A little further on the train stopped at
+Overton Station, and his Lordship got out. Just as he was shutting the
+door he said to the gentleman: “That little anecdote which you just told
+your friend about that crossing is not true, and when you say anything
+more about it you may say that Lord Fitzwilliam told you so.”
+
+The Northampton line was opened in 1845, and I remember being in the
+Cathedral when the first engine came down. It stopped at the end of the
+Fair Meadow, for the Dean and Chapter prevented the line being brought
+any nearer the town, as they would not have Bridge Fair interfered with.
+The engine was only about one-third the size of what they are now, but
+when it blew off steam people said they would never be able to hear
+anything in the Cathedral! Yet now no notice is taken of what was looked
+upon then as a deafening noise.
+
+We had next the London and York Railway, which then crossed the Thorpe
+Road near where the old mill stood. Lord Fitzwilliam compelled the
+Company to put the line by the side of the Syston and Peterborough
+Railway, where it is now. There were some amusing incidents connected
+with the Syston Railway. It was strongly opposed by Lord Harborough, and
+there were riots and fights between his men and the surveyors of the
+line. I will say no more about the railway system.
+
+The communications with Peterborough would be very incomplete if one
+forgot the river, because the river in those days was very necessary to
+the comfort of the town. I daresay now, if I were to quote Cowper’s
+lines:
+
+ Nen’s barge-laden waves,
+
+people might say they did not think the load is very heavy. But before
+the construction of the railway, and for some year’s afterwards, barges
+were found in very great abundance. We derived our whole coal supply
+from the river, and it was our great channel for carrying corn and
+timber. The importance of the Nene to the counties through which it
+passed was very great. Amongst other things was a Packet called
+“Simpson’s Packet,” and another belonging to Messrs. James and Thomas
+Hill, which conveyed light goods and passengers between Peterborough and
+Wisbech. I recollect the old gentleman who commanded the packet held a
+very high rank in the Navy indeed. He was a wooden-legged old gentleman,
+very much respected, and known by the name of Admiral Russell. He was
+commander of the Packet for many years. I do not know who succeeded him,
+but someone who did not attain so high a rank.
+
+There was a joke against Mr. Whalley, M.P., that he promised to make
+Peterborough a Seaport. If the projected scheme had been fairly carried
+out according to the original intention of the promoters, there would not
+have been a deal of money wasted. Some think even now it should not be
+given up altogether, if only for the purpose of preventing the railway
+companies from putting too high prices on the carriage of goods in cases
+where speed of transit is not essential. Goods used to be brought from
+Wisbech in lighters, and it was a serious thing in frosty weather,
+because all our coals were brought by the river, and when the frost
+lasted long there was danger of a coal famine.
+
+Now I may mention about the postage. When I first knew Peterborough the
+postage of a letter to London was 8d. A little further on it would be
+10d., and go on, until it came to about 1s. 4d. When you were going to
+London in those days you would receive visits from your friends, who
+would ask you to take letters for them and put them in the 2d. Post in
+London, and sometimes it happened that these letters were found in your
+coat pocket when you got home again! The postage of a ½oz. letter was
+8d., but if you cut the sheet of paper in two and used one-half as an
+envelope, the postage was 1s. 4d. If you divided the sheet of paper
+again and wrote a cheque on one quarter of it, and the receipt to be
+signed and returned on the other and put them into the other half sheet,
+the postage was again doubled. When I was at school my eldest brother,
+in a fit of benevolence, sent me 2s. 6d. in a letter, and I was delighted
+until I was told the postage was 2s. 8d. The matron, however, found a
+way out of it. She put the 2s. 8d. down to the governor’s account, and I
+had the half-crown.
+
+These rates of postage were very heavy, but Members of Parliament had the
+privilege of what was called “franking” letters. They were continually
+being applied to for these franks. They were only allowed, however, to
+send a certain number of letters, and you always ran the risk of having a
+bill sent in from the Post Office to the person having the privilege of
+“franking,” and they would send a footman to you, and you would then have
+to pay your share. This privilege of franking was abused, and one would
+hear that so and so had franked a ham, and one person was said to have
+franked a piano! Whether this was the truth or not I do not know, but it
+shows the advantage of getting rid of exceptional privileges.
+
+A few words about the government of our City. When I first came to the
+Town, the principal governor, the one who made the greatest impression on
+my youthful imagination, at all events, was the Beadle. He was a very
+important personage. His principal duty was to see the tramps out of the
+town. He could not arrest them, but had to “fidget” them out. He was
+always chosen with special reference to his age and infirmity. He had a
+long robe, a mace, and a cocked hat. He looked very imposing, almost
+like Old Scarlett in the Cathedral put into a long coat, a pair of knee
+breeches, and a cocked hat. He was paid in this way: At the Quarter
+Sessions he waited upon the Magistrates with a bill: “A man and a woman
+sent out Stamford Road,” “Two tramps and a child, Lincoln Road,” and so
+on. As we say educationally, he was paid by results. He was allowed so
+much according to his services. He was the principal officer of the
+place, and was appointed by the Feoffees.
+
+About the year 1857 we were protected by Parish Constables, and I think
+the principal duty of the constable was to report himself at the Quarter
+Sessions. We had two gaols—we could not do with one! One of these was
+that in the Minster Precincts, recently vacated by the School of Art.
+The other stood upon what is now the site of the Cumbergate Almshouses.
+The one in the Minster Yard was maintained by Lord Exeter as Lord
+Paramount. The other one, I think, was paid for by the Magistrates. In
+1840 we got an Act of Parliament for a new gaol, and it was brought about
+in this way: In about the year 1838 or 1839 a person walking through the
+Minster Yard saw a head pop up out of the pavement, a body followed,
+walked off, and was never heard of again. The man had simply undermined
+the foundations of his cell with a knife or bone and disappeared! He was
+the first that discovered that way of escape!
+
+About the same time in Peterborough was a family named Rogers. They were
+the black sheep of the place. The head of the family was known as Jimmy
+Rogers, and he took it into his head to dine one day upon sheep’s head
+and pluck which he stole from a butcher’s shop. He was ordered to be put
+into the Feoffees’ Gaol. He picked his way out, and this thief of the
+district and his family disappeared and never came back again. It was
+thought to be time we had a gaol, and the present building on the Thorpe
+Road was erected.
+
+You must not think that we had no amusements. We used to have a theatre
+on the site where the Corn Exchange now stands, and a very good theatre
+it was. A very good company used to come for about three months in the
+summer, and a very good entertainment was afforded. The Bishop and his
+Lady of those days used to make a point of attending during the season,
+and it was quite the thing to go to the theatre.
+
+The Fairs were very important in those days. The importance must not be
+judged by what is seen of them now. Bridge Fair was then most important.
+It shows the antiquity of the fairs that they had a special Court. All
+fairs and markets of any antiquity had this Court which was to do justice
+between man and man in any disputes arising at the fairs.
+
+We had two Balls regularly, one for the National School and one for the
+Infirmary. When political feeling ran high one Party would go to the
+National School Ball and the other to the Infirmary Ball. At other times
+each party would go to both.
+
+Peterborough was one of the last places in which Sedan chairs flourished.
+They went on until some time after the railways were established, which
+altered everything. The men were too much occupied to be able to go with
+the Sedan chairs when they were wanted, and so they gradually died out.
+
+ [Picture: A Peterborough Sedan Chair. “Peterborough was one of the last
+ places in which Sedan chairs flourished.”—Andrew Percival]
+
+Whittlesey Mere existed in those days. It was thus called because it had
+nothing whatever to do with Whittlesey. It was several miles away.
+Whittlesey Mere was one of the wonders of Huntingdonshire, Whittlesey
+being in Cambridgeshire. Whittlesey Mere was a charming place for
+skating in frosty weather and for fishing in the summer time, when there
+was water enough, and for boating under the same circumstances.
+Sometimes, when there had been a dry time it became so shallow that you
+stirred up mud from the bottom when you attempted to sail. It was very
+good for fishing. One day we were out with a party, and we stopped at
+old Bellamy Bradford’s landing place. It shelved off so gradually that
+the distinction between grass and water was so graduated that a large
+pike, probably in pursuit of a fish, had gone so far as to be prevented
+from getting back to his native element. The place was surrounded by
+reed shoals, where reeds for thatching grew, and these were the resort of
+innumerable starlings.
+
+ [Picture: Photo. T. N. Green. Ball & Co., Peterborough. A bit of Old
+ Paston. Peterborough people used to be married and buried in the
+enclosed parish of Paston—a kind of oasis in the desert.—Andrew Percival]
+
+
+
+
+PART THE SECOND.
+
+
+AN OASIS IN THE DESERT.—OLD SYSTEM OF CASTOR FARMING.—A LIGHTED
+BEACON.—THE FEN AROUND US.—DRAINING THE GREAT LEVEL.—THE MILL SYSTEM OF
+DRAINING.—SNATCHED FROM THE SEA.—HOW LAND IMPROVED IN VALUE.—“INTELLIGENT
+FENMEN.”—OLD TOWN BRIDGE.—OLD-TIME JAUNT THROUGH THE CITY.—POOR HOUSE AND
+NEW GAOL.—THORPE ROAD HOSTELRY.—NEWTOWN.—THE GREAT BREWERIES AND THE
+PONDS.—CABBAGE ROW.—BURIAL AT CROSS ROADS.—FROG HALL.—GAS WORKS
+STARTED.—OLD MARKET.—LADIES AND THE CATTLE.—WEDNESDAY MARKET.—A CURIOSITY
+MARKET.—GOD’S ACRE.
+
+THE great point which strikes us all, and which strikes everyone
+considering the history of the last seventy years in the City of
+Peterborough is the very great increase in the population, and when one
+began to think how it came about we used to say “it is owing to the
+railways.” But that is like telling you that the world, as the Indians
+say, is supported on the back of a tortoise! You want to know why the
+railways were wanted, what the tortoise stands upon, because if you look
+into statistics seventy years ago, before the railways, the population of
+Peterborough was considerably increasing, and the populations of
+agricultural districts altogether were very much increasing, and when you
+go a little further, if you look at all into the history of the land
+around Peterborough, or the country altogether, you will find within a
+century there had been a great change. Now, take for instance the
+immediate neighbourhood of Peterborough. My recollection of it begins,
+as I have said, at the latter end of 1833, at the commencement of the
+last century. I think the only parish, if I except Fletton, the only
+enclosed parish within some few miles of this place was the parish of
+Paston.
+
+There you will rind the church, surrounded by old trees, and the parish
+differed very much from others. If you look into the Churchyard there
+you will find a great many names of the inhabitants of Peterborough and
+other parishes outside Paston. If you look into the Paston register you
+will find marriages solemnised between inhabitants not belonging to
+Paston, the undoubted fact being that the enclosed parish of Paston led
+people to desire they should be married and buried there. Paston was a
+kind of oasis in the desert.
+
+Most of the parishes around here were in the position and character of
+Castor, which until recently was the only open field parish within many
+miles of this place. I was riding through Castor field some years ago,
+before it was enclosed, with a few farmers, when one turned round and
+said: “How should you like to farm this parish?” “Not at all,” was the
+reply. A man in the parish who had a farm of a hundred acres would have
+to go to his farm in four different parts of the parish—some against
+Ailsworth, Milton Park, Alwalton, and so on, perhaps scattered in pieces
+of one acre, two roods, and so forth. So that with a large farm a man
+would have to go to a farm of a hundred acres to as many different places
+two or three miles apart. The pieces were so narrow that they were like
+ribbons; you could plough lengthways but not crossways. As soon as you
+turned, you got on to your neighbour’s land, which was frequently a
+subject of dispute. Conceive the state of the cultivation of the country
+generally when that was the system not only in one parish, but in the
+general bulk, at all events, in this part of the kingdom.
+
+Peterborough was open. All the parishes, to my knowledge, from
+Peterborough to Deeping, and east to west, have been enclosed since 1812.
+There was a beacon lighted at night to light the passengers over the
+weary waste, since brought into cultivation. Just conceive, if you can,
+the state in which this part of the country was then, and in what it is
+now, and consider the great increase of corn that can be grown, and not
+only corn that can be grown, but the stock that can be fed by the
+cultivation of roots and the introduction of bone manure, and then you
+get some idea of the increased production of the country, that rendered
+improved roads, terminating in railroads, necessary. For the same
+reason, the marvellous increase in the manufacturing districts has been
+kept pace with in the agricultural production of the country, another
+feature in our neighbourhood.
+
+If you begin at Cambridge and draw a line along the high land by St.
+Ives, east of Peterborough, by Spalding and Boston, down to the Humber,
+you will find the tract of land known as the Fen Country. That country
+has undergone within the last seventy or eighty years, or a great part of
+it, a change even more striking than that which has passed over the
+uplands. At first you would be inclined to doubt whether there were any
+such places as the Fens at all. If you say to anybody “Don’t you live in
+the Fens”? the reply will be “Oh, no.” At Peterborough we are not in the
+Fens. Of course not! There is Flag Fen, and there is Borough Fen, but
+we are on high ground, and not in the Fen, and you will find, even if you
+go east of Wisbech, where the land is called marsh land, which sounds
+rather funny, that the farmers and graziers there will say they don’t
+live in the Fens. And walking towards the sea you will always be told
+you have come to the wrong place, you must go a little further, and then
+you will find the Fen country! But still, take the Fens as we know them,
+extending from Peterborough to Cambridge, and down by Boston nearly to
+the Humber.
+
+I will confine my observations to that which most comes within my own
+knowledge, that district of the Fens known as the Bedford Level, called
+the South, the Middle, and the North Level. From the beginning of
+Crowland on the North, down to, say, the Middle by March and Lynn, and
+the South down to Cambridge. In the year 1637 a Charter was passed by
+Charles I. for the improvement of that country, and we form some notion
+of what it must have been—the weary waste of waters it must have
+been—from the preamble of the Charter of Incorporation. It is described
+as being generally covered with water, of little advantage to mankind,
+except yielding some few river fish and water fowl, that is when you may
+catch them, and on lucky days you may shoot wild ducks. Adventurers had
+endeavoured to make lines of meadows, which had made such progress that
+it was hoped this place, which had lately presented nothing to the eye
+but waters and a few reeds thinly scattered here and there, might, under
+Divine mercy, become some of it pleasant pasture for cattle, with many
+houses belonging to the inhabitants. That seemed to have been the
+extreme notion of what could be made of that country in the way of
+production. Going on to the year 1830, when the last history of the
+Bedford Level was written by Mr. Samuel Wells, well known as the Register
+of the Corporation, he speaks of it seventy-five years ago as a matter of
+congratulation that at that time, when they had improved it sufficiently
+to grow oats and cole seed, that the cultivation of wheat had begun to
+extend itself into the Fen country. He spoke of it almost as a novelty,
+and says that the Corporation, soon after its formation, had interfered
+to prevent the inhabitants, occupiers, and owners of property from
+improving and draining by mills. He says that the system of drainage by
+mills was abandoned in consequence of the result of the suit to prevent
+it being favourable to the Corporation.
+
+However, in a short time, after many struggles, the Level becoming so
+inundated by the choking of interior drains, the defective state of the
+rivers, and neglected improvement of outfalls, the Corporation found it
+impossible to resist the importunity of the country to resort to
+artificial drainage, and therefore waived their objection, and allowed a
+return of the mill system. The mill system up to 1830 consisted simply
+of working a machine by wind to lift the water out of some embanked
+portion of the Fens into a drain at a higher level, to conduct it to one
+of the main drains of the Corporation to the outfall in the sea. Seventy
+years ago, Mr. Wells tells us, in the whole district of the Bedford
+Level—350,000 acres—there were only five steam engines, one being in the
+parish of Newboro’, put up on the enclosuse. He says there was a general
+opinion that steam drainage would be further prosecuted, but this
+depended upon the finances of the district, and he goes on to say many
+intelligent Fenmen indulged the hope of acquiring a natural drainage,
+when the result of the work now undertaken, in a greater or a less degree
+on all three levels, can be fully understood and ascertained. The
+author, however, says he cannot rank himself amongst the number of those
+sanguine persons. He thought it great progress to get five steam
+engines, and hoping they would get more, he, as an intelligent Fenman,
+thought it was as much as he could anticipate.
+
+I think in the year 1827 or 1828 one of those works, the Nene outfall,
+had been undertaken, the object of which was to make the channel to the
+sea through the high and shifting sands, which were at the entrance of
+the Wash, through which the waters of the Nene found their way to the
+sea. It was carried out. I think Mr. Tycho Wing was the great
+inaugurator and Sir Jno. Rennie the engineer. It was so thoroughly
+successful that it at once allowed the interior drainage of the country
+to be vastly improved, and not only so, but up to the present time, by
+the operation of the Nene Outfall Act, no less than 5,800 acres of land
+have been actually reclaimed from the sea, the value of which is at least
+from £40 to £50 per acre. Not only was the Fen district materially
+improved, but a tract of country equal to a large parish was obtained,
+the value of which alone would, in a measure, repay all the expense of
+the undertaking. Then they went on, following the success of that, to
+get the North Level Act in 1830. The effect of that was that water mills
+and steam mills disappeared, and they now have natural drainage by the
+water finding its way by gravitation to the sea.
+
+In 1840 a similar work was begun in the Middle Level, and they now have
+natural drainage in nearly the whole of that Level. The only exception
+is about Whittlesey Mere, where they have a steam pump and a steam
+water-wheel to carry away the floods. What was the effect of that? In
+the first place a tax was put on. In the Middle Level and North Level
+the yearly tax may be taken at about 8s. 6d. or 9s. per acre altogether.
+It sounds a very large sum where the land itself, in many instances, was
+worth next to nothing before, but the effect has been that in that
+district, I am not exaggerating when I say, leaving the tax out of the
+question, that is, after putting the tax on the land and comparing it to
+what it was before, the land is worth double, and, in many instances,
+treble, and where land without the tax was worth £10 an acre, it is now
+worth £20 or £30. I have had through my hands deeds of an estate in the
+Fen. It contained 200 acres. In 1824 it was sold for £1,155; in 1829
+for £1,880. In 1882, notwithstanding the time of depression, it was sold
+for £5,000, without any special bargain. Just think of the increase in
+the value of the country in consequence of what has been done, and I
+think you will see at once why the district has required railway
+accommodation.
+
+[Picture: City wooden bridge over the Nene. Replaced 1872. Old Photo by
+ William Ball, Peterborough]
+
+Mr. Wells speaks of the “Intelligent Fenmen.” I believe in their
+intelligence! In their Parliamentary battles they are as warlike as
+people can be in protecting the valuable interests of which they are the
+custodians, and counsel in Parliamentary committees have often said: “How
+well those men understand their business; how ready they are, and what
+talent they show in stating and maintaining their cause.” That is rather
+a digression, but it accounts very much, I think, for the great changes
+in this part of the country to which we belong.
+
+Now let me endeavour to show the changes in Peterborough proper. I will
+supply an omission, with an apology to my old friend, the old Town
+Bridge. I am ashamed to find that in my previous notes I had omitted to
+say anything about it. That was rather extraordinary, because I had my
+mind on it, and when I first came from Northampton my first acquaintance
+with Peterborough must have been “over that bridge.” There is an old
+proverb which says “Find no fault with the bridge which carries you
+over.” With every disposition to be charitable, that is the only good
+thing I can say of the old Bridge. It carried me over, and there was no
+instance that it ever fell in, but there was always a fear that it would
+fall, and everybody thought it ought to fall, but it did not, and I
+mention this because I think our new Bridge is a striking instance of the
+public spirit of the inhabitants of Peterborough and the neighbourhood in
+subscribing the cost of one-half of it, and also of the fairness and
+liberality which the county authorities displayed in meeting the
+inhabitants in assisting to get a new bridge—a credit to the
+district—rather than patch up that shabby, ramshackle concern, which,
+patched from time to time, might have outlived another hundred years, and
+a suspicion that it would fall, but never actually falling.
+
+ [Picture: From an Old Print. Sexton Barns. “A Fine Old Building; an
+ object which vanished when the Railways were made, because now it is the
+ Site of the G.N. Station.”—Andrew Percival]
+
+We will walk up Bridge Street and take a turn round the outskirts of the
+town as I knew it years ago. Going past the toll-bar in Cowgate we come
+to the building known as Sexton Barns; probably some of you recollect it,
+a fine old building; it was an object that vanished when the railways
+were made, because now it is the site of the G.N. Station. There was a
+handsome tree near the Crescent, where Peterborough began to stray into
+the country; the Crescent had been erected four or five years before.
+Opposite was the house where Mrs. Cattel lived, and then the house where
+Dr. Skrimshire lived (now Dr. Keeton’s). Walking a little further, we
+came to the Town Mill; very much like the Town Bridge, it had seen better
+days and, like the Bridge, it had had a history. It had been the
+property of the Dean and Chapter, and, without the smallest doubt, it
+came down to them from the Abbot and Convent, who were the Lords of this
+district. These town mills were mills which the largest landowners kept
+for the accommodation of their tenants, who were thereby provided with
+the means of grinding their corn at a small cost, but were compelled to
+use them and pay grist to the millers, and the old law books contain much
+on the subject. Its need passed away, the mill got into private hands;
+it seems to have become worse and worse, and at last it was burnt down,
+and we know it no more, the very site having been utilised in an exchange
+of property for the erection of the present King’s School in Park Road.
+
+On the opposite side is the Union Workhouse, built about 1834 or 1835.
+It has been very much beautified, but it is not a handsome building now.
+It has had a new front or facing. I may mention in passing that I
+recollect at one time there was a persistent cry made by some portion of
+the Press against the new Poor Law, against the hardship of separating
+man and wife, and so on, but never was so persistent an attempt made in
+that part of a portion of the Press with such signal failure at the time,
+although since come to pass where desirable. The new Poor Law took the
+place of one that was probably ruining the country, and is, in these
+later days, itself under review.
+
+We then walk along the road back towards Peterborough, and we find the
+Gaol and Sessions House. This Gaol was built in 1840. There was a fight
+between the Dean and Chapter, and their Lessee, and the Magistrates about
+the enormous price asked for it, and a jury was appointed, but a price of
+two or three times more than was paid at that time for the land has been
+paid since for land. If anyone had it to sell now at the same price he
+would be very happy.
+
+Between the Gaol and the Workhouse there is a nice quiet-looking
+residence (Mr. Noble’s). It was, till recently, devoted to the supply of
+milk, but it was built as a public house, put up by a brewery in order to
+supply accommodation for people who resorted to the Sessions House at the
+weekly meetings of the Magistrates, and at the Quarter Sessions. There
+was a temperance wit of the day who said, “No, it is put there to show
+the close and intimate connection between the gin shop, the gaol, and the
+workhouse.” We will go back to the town, the whole of that known as
+Newtown, long before the railways, between 1815 and 1833, had been
+erected, so that it was, strictly and literally, “Newtown.”
+
+We then pass Squire’s Brewery at the entrance to Lincoln Road, where the
+Liberal Club and Masonic Hall now stand, and we go to Boroughbury; all
+beyond the malting formed part of Squire’s Brewery, going past what is
+known as the “Square Pond.” The houses there, including a large part of
+the Catholic Church and other buildings, are actually built upon that
+which was, in 1833 (and many years afterwards), covered with water. I
+was intimate with Mr. Buckle, who succeeded Mr. Squire in that brewery,
+and I was permitted to fish in the pond as often as I pleased. I have
+stood upon that spot which is now a public road and have caught pike and
+eels, and used to have very capital sport there. In the winter time it
+was a favourite resort, not thrown open to the public altogether, but
+still, with great liberality, it was allowed to be used for skating. I
+was very unlucky one day. It was just after a gentleman had bought the
+house, afterwards Mrs. Willoughby’s (now shops erected by Mr. W. D.
+Nichols), and the grounds about it, was walking in his grounds, when he
+saw me pull out a large pike, and he was so enchanted with it, he thought
+it would be a great benefit to his property, and to my disgust, but the
+pleasure of Mr. Buckle, he bought the pond and merged it into his private
+grounds. I never caught any pike there again!
+
+Passing the outskirts of the town, we pass the great Tithe Barn,
+Boroughbury, an interesting and attractive specimen of antiquity and a
+good specimen of that kind of barn. You go up that junction of Lincoln
+Road to Dogsthorpe, and there past the last house until you come to two
+or three cottages, then belonging to a retired tailor, named Mitchell,
+and people had been profane enough to christen those cottages “Cabbage
+Row.” What connection there is between a tailor and cabbage, I don’t
+know.
+
+Crossing the fields now laid out by the great roads of the Land Company,
+and which at that time were the most secluded fields around Peterborough,
+and going down Crawthorne Lane you came to a junction—a little lane at
+the back of Boroughbury, now a wide street behind St. Mark’s Villas,
+which runs up to Park Road, and there four roads met, where there was a
+little tombstone which was known as the “Girls’ Grave.” A girl was
+buried there, with a stake through her body, without Christian burial.
+The place was very well known, and for long remained in the midst of a
+potato garden belonging to one of the cottages there.
+
+You go as the crow flies to a place called Frog Hall, in front of St.
+Mary’s Vicarage, one of the cottages remained till 1904, and the place
+had a very unsavoury reputation. It was inhabited by squatters, gipsies,
+and travellers, and was one of the least desirable parts in that
+neighbourhood. Then came a row of cottages known as Burton’s Row, where
+Peterborough attempted to travel past its boundaries and get into the
+country.
+
+Going back, we come to the Cemetery, but at that time all were grass
+fields let out as accommodation ground, and quite secluded. A little
+further on were the Gas Works. Now they ARE Gas Works. When I came they
+were, as compared with the present, in about the same proportion as a
+small kettle to a large steam engine boiler. A gentleman named Malam—a
+Hull man—used to supply all the little towns in the country, and used to
+contract with the inhabitants to supply gas for them. There was no Act
+of Parliament, or anything of that sort, but permission from the Local
+Authorities to break up the streets and roads was all that was required,
+and he chanced it. I think Mr. Sawyer used to give as much time as he
+could spare from his own business, until he became, as the town
+increased, by purchase, the owner of the works, and he then gave his
+whole time and attention to them, and a very nice property it developed
+into by the time the present company took it off Mr. Sawyer’s hands.
+
+That is the history of gas in Peterborough. This brings us back to the
+Long Causeway and the Market Place. Not the market now, as I recollect
+it! Up to the year 1848 the farmers attending the market used to cool
+their heels in the open air in front of the Town Hall, hot or cold, wet
+or dry, rain or snow, blowing or still, there they stood, till the
+Theatre, now the Corn Exchange (since largely added to), became vacant,
+and it occurred to some agricultural gentleman that they could be much
+more comfortable in every way if they could form a company, and they did
+so, and I think no one will doubt that is an improvement. On the Long
+Causeway, the Cattle Market was the principal institution of the place,
+and I will tell you why. On Saturdays that place was wholly given up to
+them. There they were; nobody paid anything; anybody who had cows or
+horses to sell brought them there. They became the proprietors of the
+street for that day.
+
+Our widest and best street was spoilt; because if there is one thing more
+certain than another it is that the female mind most intensely abhors
+anything approaching contact with horned animals. Somehow or other, it
+seems to disturb that equanimity which appears to be utterly
+indispensable to a lady when she is going what she calls “shopping,” and
+it would take away all her ideas to think she was going to meet a
+restless-looking cow or a doubtful looking ox. It takes away all notion
+of colour, shape, and measure, or whether the thing will wash or not.
+The consequence was, the Long Causeway was practically abandoned on
+market days, and it was not much more used on other days for shopping
+purposes, because in anything like changeable or damp weather the
+atmosphere of the street was what I have heard ladies describe (not
+meaning to be complimentary) as “smelly.” Therefore, naturally, there
+was great rejoicing among the inhabitants generally when that street was
+restored to a cleanly wholesome state by the construction of the Cattle
+Market.
+
+The Wednesday Cattle Market had a very peculiar growth. It was set up
+without the smallest authority about 1845 or 1846 by an old gentleman
+named Dean, who was a retired farmer, and an enterprising auctioneer
+named Dowse, who kept the “Greyhound.” They suggested that fat stock
+should be brought, and it came more and more, until it grew into that
+excellent stock market, which became one of the best in the Kingdom.
+There was no foundation for it but that of custom. When the new market
+was proposed, the farmers invited the then authorities, the Improvement
+Commissioners, to construct it for them, but they made their bow and
+said, “If you want a market, make it for yourselves.” It was made by a
+limited company, and it has since fallen into the hands of the
+authorities, and Broadway constructed through it.
+
+We have another market which has grown up, and that is the present
+Wednesday Market on the Market Place, which I think is one of the
+greatest curiosities that ever comes under one’s notice. It does no harm
+to anyone. I went there recently, and I saw an extraordinary medley of
+things exposed for sale. I wondered at first if they were to be given
+away! I could understand anybody wishing to sell them, but wondered who
+could wish to buy them. It is one of the things no one can understand.
+But it affords the means of getting rid of most undesirable things, call
+them furniture, or anything else! It puts me in mind of a shop in the
+Market Place at Great Yarmouth, where they say you may buy anything. A
+visitor, a clergyman, was told he could get anything he wanted. He said,
+“I want a pulpit.” “Well,” his friend said, “go in and try.” He went in
+and said, “Do you happen to have a pulpit?” and they said, “Well, we do
+happen to have a pulpit.” And I think I have seen everything in our
+Wednesday’s Market except that. I have not seen anything so useful as a
+pulpit!
+
+I have spoken of our accommodation for the living. What do we do for the
+dead? We have the Cemetery, which has been considerably enlarged since
+it was first formed in 1852 or 1853, and the rapid increase of the
+Cemetery suggests the difficulty of the disposal of the dead in a
+creditable and satisfactory manner with our increasing population. The
+old burial ground was opened in the year 1802, and it is one of the
+peculiarities of this peculiar place, and of the old jurisdictions here,
+that the old Parish Church appears to have had in ancient times no burial
+ground belonging to it, a thing that very seldom happens, for the burial
+ground of the Parish of St. John the Baptist was outside the Minster,
+which is an extra parochial district. This remained up to 1802, when the
+burial ground in Cowgate was formed. If you go into it sometime (I am
+very fond of looking at the tombstones), you will find the oddest
+peculiarities of language and literature as inscriptions on the
+tombstones, but I cannot say I have ever found much to admire. You will
+find a collection of legends which are common all over the country,
+commencing with
+
+ Affliction sore, long time he bore,
+ Physicians WAS in vain.
+
+Next to it:
+
+ Pale consumption gave the silent BELOW, etc.
+
+In our graveyard in Cowgate there is an epitaph upon old Mrs. Thomas, by
+which you are informed, that
+
+ Making carpets and beds she did pursue
+ With care and industry is very true,
+ The established religion she did profess
+ In hopes, through Christ, of Heaven to possess.
+
+Such rubbish as that, under the veto of the present Cemetery
+Commissioners, will, I hope, soon disappear. But there is one in the
+Cathedral graveyard (the existence of which is not generally known), on
+the tombstone memorial of an old family of this place, and I trust it
+will not be allowed to disappear. It is very superior to what they
+generally are. It is on the right just as you go through the Arch by the
+Deanery, and is to the memory of one of the Richardson family:
+
+ Stranger pass by nor idly waste your time
+ In bad biography or bitter rhyme;
+ For what I am, this cumbrous clay ensures,
+ And what I was, is no affair of yours.
+
+The old gentleman, as you see, has carried his cynical humour to the
+grave with him. It was quoted in an article in “Blackwood’s Magazine” on
+“Monumental Inscriptions” a few years since.
+
+ [Picture: Peterborough Market Place A.D. 1795. N. Fielding of Stamford.
+ Specially drawn from a painting in Peterborough Museum]
+
+
+
+
+PART THE THIRD.
+
+
+NEWSPAPERS.—DISTEMPER.—GUILDHALL.—HANGINGS.—DARING BURGLARIES.—A LOCK-UP
+STORY.—AN ALIBI.—THE MUD CASE.—WHEN THE RAILWAYS FIRST
+CAME.—RETROSPECTIVE.
+
+IN my former Notes I alluded to the Post Office. Well, the first Post
+Office I recollect was a little room about 10ft. square—I think it has
+been altered since—in one of those houses at the back of the “White Lion”
+gates. An old gentleman lived there who was Postmaster, and I think he
+was assisted, being rather infirm, by his daughter, and I have been told
+it was the amusement of a little grandchild or a little boy accustomed to
+visit him, that by way of a treat he was allowed to catch letters in his
+pinafore, and as a grand treat he was allowed to stamp them. At that
+time the Post Office establishment consisted of the Postmaster, the lady
+who assisted him, and the letter carrier, who, as some of you recollect,
+was Mrs. Waterfield, a tidy woman, who had a little basket in which she
+carried letters. By degrees the establishment got on. You will bear in
+mind that at that time we were not troubled with Post Office Orders.
+There was no way of conveying 5s. or 6s. in stamps, or by order, from one
+part of the country to another. The present Post Office consists of
+palatial buildings, since their enlargement in 1904, and great
+departmental accommodation, the smallest room of which is larger than
+that old Post Office altogether. It would not do now to catch letters in
+a pinafore, as their number is many millions a month. There are
+telegraph messages, Post Office Orders, and Savings Bank business. The
+Postmaster and old woman have grown into a Postmaster at £500 a year,
+Chief Clerk, a very important personage, the Assistant Superintendent
+(Postal Department), the Assistant Superintendent (Telegraph Department),
+7 controllers, and a staff numbering altogether nearly 350, with 66
+sub-Post Offices—a pretty good number. A great deal of the business is
+forwarding mails passing through Peterborough, as a convenient centre for
+such purposes.
+
+Then, as to newspapers, we used to have once a week the “Stamford
+Mercury,” a very good paper, full of advertisements and local news, but
+the “Stamford Mercury” was always conducted on this principle: “Opinion
+is quite free in this country, and we are going to dictate to nobody,” so
+you never have editorial articles in the “Stamford Mercury.” They used
+sometimes to select leaders and bits of intelligence from other papers,
+generally of one way of thinking. Then we used to have the London
+papers. They cost 7d. each. London papers used to come down the day
+after publication, after they had gone the round of the club houses, the
+hotels, and the London eating houses. Those that had been in the eating
+houses used sometimes to come in rather a greasy form. Now we can have
+the “Times” on our breakfast table, or earlier if wished. After a time
+some gentlemen thought we were very benighted in Peterborough, and two of
+them, very much in advance of their age, started what we should now call
+a Society paper of a very pronounced type called the “Peterborough
+Argus.” The first one heard of it was, after one or two publications,
+that a solicitor had inflicted upon the responsible Editor a sound
+thrashing for a libel. The case went to the Northampton Assizes, and
+although the verdict was not quite “served him right,” the publisher got
+damages of very small amount. It was one of the most scurrilous papers
+in its way, and at length it became intolerable.
+
+We now have in Peterborough four newspapers, besides a most ample supply
+of daily newspapers. It has been very interesting to witness the growth
+of Peterborough newspapers, particularly that of the ADVERTISER (the
+first in the field—in 1854) from its small two pages to the very
+satisfactory form in which it now appears, with its mid-weekly auxiliary,
+the CITIZEN. There was also a difficulty as to supply of books. There
+was a book club, the Church Porch Club, existing fifty years ago, and one
+or two others, but somehow or other literature did not thrive very much
+in Peterborough. One gentleman retired from the book club, and when
+asked why he gave up he said “The fact is I cannot eat suppers any
+longer.” It does not strike me as a good reason to give up reading,
+because one would have thought he could have read better without his
+supper. However, they were not then so badly off for newspapers as they
+were 150 years ago.
+
+I mentioned just now the “Stamford Mercury.” I have before me a copy of
+the “Stamford Mercury” a friend has kindly lent me, that I might extract
+a little valuable comparison. What should we think if our intellectual
+food came from sources such as that we got, for instance, in the year
+1730, as seen in the “Stamford Mercury.” It then had a most aspiring
+title, as you will see:—“The STAMFORD MERCURY, being Historical and
+Political Observations on the Transactions of Europe, Together with
+Remarks on Trade.” Here is this little sheet—a good-sized sheet of
+letter paper, one-eighth taken up by the title and an illustrated figure
+of “Mercury.” Another eighth is literally taken up by “Bills of
+Mortality of London for the week or month,” and from it I wonder what
+some of the diseases of that day were. One person died of
+“Headmouldshot,” one of “Horse Shoehead,” and amongst other things there
+is very large mortality attributed to “teeth.” Another eighth of that
+paper is taken up with price lists, giving the rate of exchange between
+London and Madrid, also between London and Cadiz, etc. Then prices of
+goods at “Bear Key.” Another eighth is given up to observations upon the
+affairs of Europe: “Our Government has received advice from Florence that
+Princess Dowager Palatine has renounced all her pretentions to the
+succession in favour of Don Carlos,” and such pieces as that, and then
+the other half is taken up with advertisements. It is a curious thing
+that in one advertisement we are told “To Let, the Three Tuns, an old
+accustomed inn on the Market Place at Peterborough, Northamptonshire,”
+that being the site where the present Stamford and Spalding Bank now
+stands. That was in 1730.
+
+Twenty years later, in 1755, there is an Ipswich paper, and to show how
+history repeats itself, for the consolation of our farming friends, we
+are told that amongst other Acts just passed was one to continue several
+laws relating to the distemper then raging among the horned cattle in the
+Kingdom. There is nothing new under the sun. We have had it before, and
+no doubt they said in that time legislation very much interfered with the
+markets. Another curious thing in the paper is this: “The ship the Royal
+George was put out of the Dock to go to Spithead.” Was this the Royal
+George that “went down with twice 400 men”? Public news was important
+just then. There are details as to watching the French Fleet. Those
+were very anxious times, but the peculiarity of those papers is that they
+gave you so little of what may be called local news. Our own local
+papers give you ample City News and a Complete Chronicle of the affairs
+of villages; but you may look through those papers and find nothing
+approaching local news excepting this:—
+
+ “By a letter from Thirsk in Yorkshire we learn that very lately a
+ terrible shock of earthquake was felt, inasmuch that several large
+ rocks were removed to considerable distances; several large grown
+ elms were swallowed up by the earth so that no part of them remained
+ to be seen but the uppermost branches. A man driving a cart near the
+ place, the horses were so much frightened by the shock that they
+ broke loose from the carriage and ran away. The horses seem to have
+ behaved very sensibly.”
+
+Then there is an advertisement which strikes one as rather peculiar,
+because I think if some of the ladies now-a-days happened of this
+misfortune you would hardly put it in the paper:—
+
+ “Lost out of Tom Shave’s London caravan between London and Ipswich
+ (but supposed to be dropped between here and Colchester) a small
+ black trunk, containing a pink silk gown, with a pink sarsenet
+ lining, a blue silk quilted petticoat, a pink silver lined child’s
+ hat, a white chip hat with pink ribbons, a pink silk skirt, two pair
+ of white cotton stockings, two shifts, two lawn handkerchiefs and
+ owner’s other things, with a hoop petticoat tied on the outside.”
+
+Now, we have lived in the days of the crinoline, but I never saw one tied
+on the outside!
+
+To return to the City of Peterborough, we come to the Town Hall. When I
+first knew it, it was used as a Sessions House, but it did not belong to
+the magistrates, the feoffees being the owners. It was also used as a
+County Court until the present new building was erected. Speaking of the
+County Courts, for many years there was no summary jurisdiction for
+settling small debts and quarrels, and one really wonders how the world
+got on, but one feels certain there must have been a vast deal of
+injustice for the want of that which really, comparatively speaking, now
+brings justice home to everybody’s own door. Just think in 1810 how
+difficult it was to get.
+
+The Magistrates of the Liberty of Peterborough had a general commission
+of gaol delivery. There are people living in Peterborough who recollect
+a man being hanged on Butcher’s Piece, against the North Bank, under
+sentence by the local magistrates, and I should imagine there was as much
+heard of it as there is news given in this scrap of print. In 1820 an
+Act of Parliament was passed enabling Magistrates at local jurisdictions
+to commit persons charged with capital offences for trial at the Assizes.
+In the Peterborough Court no counsel used to appear, and just imagine
+what a sensation would be excited if we were now told by our Court of
+Quarter Sessions that by authority of their Charter they were going to
+hang a man. I recollect when I was a boy at school, just before I came
+to Peterborough, I have been into the Old Bailey, and I have seen put
+into the dock at the close of the Sessions 15 or 16 men and women, all of
+whom were sentenced to be executed. Sheep stealing, horse stealing, cow
+stealing, forgery, robbing a dwelling house to a certain amount were all
+at that time capital offences, and you would see in the London newspapers
+that the Recorder of the City had been down to Windsor to make his report
+to the King, and that there were so many cases of death sentences, all of
+which his Majesty was graciously pleased to respite, except some who were
+to be executed as a deterrent example.
+
+There is a novel of Theodore Hook’s which gives a most striking account,
+partly humorous, and partly tragic, of the proceedings and sentences at
+the Old Bailey in those days. One recollects in the course of his
+professional experience many cases of interest. Many striking cases of
+daring burglaries have been dealt with in Peterborough. At Glinton a
+house was broken into by five or six people, most convincing evidence was
+given of their violence and intimidation, and the coolness of the
+witnesses on the trial of the prisoners. The witnesses, as they very
+frequently are, were ordered out of Court, and as they were called they
+pointed out and identified particular prisoners. After this had been
+done two or three times, the gentlemen in the dock changed their
+positions, thinking that probably the witnesses had been tutoring one
+another, and that they would then defeat them; but it did not answer, and
+it being pointed out to the jury, it sealed their conviction, convincing
+them that the witnesses were accurate, and not tutored. The same thing
+was mentioned in the papers a few days ago as having occurred when the
+prisoners were in the dock in Dublin for the Phœnix Park murders.
+Another case occurred where a gang who had been the terror of the
+district, all strangers, broke into a house, the Thirty Acre Farm, at
+Fengate, and striking coolness and courage was shown by a girl who was
+pulled out of her bed and threatened with death to compel her to open her
+box and produce her money. She afterwards identified her assailants,
+some by their voices even. Then there was the robbery at Orton Stanch.
+The money taken by the woman there for tolls was brought to Peterborough
+weekly, and one night the place was broken into and the cash box stolen.
+
+There was a man called Jack Hall who had settled in this part of the
+country, and was connected with others of Yaxley, who committed several
+robberies in the district. Hall turned informer; he was arrested for
+something else, and gave information, and Stretton and a man named
+Humberston were taken separately. They were first allowed to see, but
+not speak to, each other, and were put into separate cells. Mr. Preston,
+who used to keep the lock-up at Fletton, locked the door of the passage
+dividing the cells, but was careful to leave a policeman in the passage,
+where he could hear any conversation between the prisoners. Towards
+morning he heard one signal, the other “Hist! Jack, what are you in for?”
+“The Stanch,” was the reply. The other said, “Jack Hall’s split upon
+us.” “Never mind” was the answer, “we must deny it altogether.” This
+conversation was proved at the trial at the assizes, and was relied upon
+to confirm the evidence. The prisoners’ counsel complained of the way
+these men had been trapped, but Lord Justice Campbell, who tried them,
+pointed out that they were not asked to say what they did, and they were
+convicted and sentenced to transportation for life.
+
+One other case, the robbery at the Vicarage. The thief was met coming
+away. He was described as a nice, gentlemanly looking man. A young
+policeman met him in the street, and that thief had the impudence to walk
+and talk to him. They walked up to the G.N. Station together, and the
+policeman thinking no harm, the burglar got clear away, but he was
+apprehended afterwards with others. There was a defence of an alibi set
+up for one, and men were brought from Northampton to declare that he was
+engaged at a tea garden there at the time. The jury did not believe
+them. The same defence is one of the most common. If proved, it is, of
+course, most conclusive, but it is very easy to set up this defence and
+get it sworn to. It was once used by a man charged with stealing a
+horse, who was found riding away upon its back. It occurs in Pickwick,
+when Mr. Weller says: “Samivel, why wasn’t there an alibi?”
+
+There have not been many civil cases of any great interest, but a few
+breaches of promise, and one rather peculiar case, known as the Mud case,
+tried on the Midland Circuit. It was a question of right of navigation
+through what is now Mr. Roberts’ granary against the river, and it was
+stated that barge after barge had been brought up there. It was shown
+that it was physically impossible for a boat to go up there, as there was
+an obstruction rendering it impossible for any boat to pass through it.
+That trial lasted for years. I was at Northampton during one of the
+trials. There was another case between two tradesmen, one of whom had
+been thrown amongst some implements, and in the first trial the verdict
+was for the defendant; in the next the plaintiff got one shilling
+damages.
+
+I have previously given particulars about the rejoicings we had when the
+railways came here. Just let me add one or two words to show it was not
+all gain when the railways came. You used, if you wanted to go to
+London, to get up early, and, by the Eastern Counties express, start at 6
+o’clock, and be four or five hours going. In going there and coming back
+you had done a hard day’s work. I used to find it necessary to be called
+in good time, and recollect asking John Frisby, who used to run after the
+mail, to call me. Instead of doing so a little before six, he called me
+at three. “John,” I said, “do you know the time?” “Yes,” he said, “I
+thought I had better be in good time.” When the railways were just made,
+there was very little difference in the time taken to go to London by the
+G.N.R. or G.E.R. A good fight took place between the two companies. You
+could run by Northampton for 5s., instead of 11s. or 12s., by the Great
+Northern, and I was once beguiled with a lady in going the cheap route.
+We started at seven and arrived in London at two in the afternoon. When
+we got there we were so tired we could not go out that day at all. We
+had return tickets, but gave them up and came back by the G.N. The Great
+Northern put a stop to it by running the direct journey there and back
+for 5s. I tried that, and, coming home, was pulled in by the window, the
+train being overcrowded, and sat not upon the seat, but the arms between,
+and experienced for several hours something like you have seen described
+after a man has been tarred and feathered, in riding a rail, or the
+sensation of the monk who went into the barber’s shop, and instead of
+paying the usual twopence, wanted to be shaved for the love of God.
+“Certainly,” said the barber; and he shaved the monk with cold water, a
+blunt razor, and a very short allowance of soap. At the conclusion of
+which the monk said, “Heaven defend me from ever being shaved again for
+the love of God.” He came to the conclusion, as I did, that it was
+better to have things at the ordinary price and have them in the regular
+way.
+
+Washington Irving tells the story of how one of the early settlers in the
+State of New York, not a very industrious person, walked out on the
+Catskill Mountains on a shooting expedition, and met with a party who
+were playing at skittles. They invited him to have some whisky and
+water, which he accepted, and immediately fell asleep, and at the close
+of half a century awoke. His faculties were in precisely the same
+condition as when he fell asleep, but the world had progressed around
+him. He went home and found those whom he had left young were grown old,
+and many of his neighbours had vanished from the scene. He had gone
+asleep under the Monarchy and awoke under the American Republic. That is
+the story, the humorous side of which is admirably painted by Washington
+Irving. It seems to me that in one point of view, at least when we
+exercise that wonderful faculty of memory that power of abstracting
+ourselves from what has passed and is passing before us, and carry
+ourselves back to the days of our youth, and for a few moments ignore all
+that has since passed around us that one is somewhat in the condition of
+Washington Irving’s hero of the tale in America! The history of a small
+city involves the history and the progress of the nation. The population
+of the country has increased relatively as the population of our own City
+has increased. The same causes which have led to our improvement have
+led to the improvement and the advancement in wealth, honour, and
+happiness of the increased population which these circumstances have
+brought into being. Nothing, I think, could be more distressing than to
+have our progress blotted out. That is not the way in which a wise and
+merciful Providence deals with his creatures. Our troubles, our
+afflictions, the memory of those we have lost, become pleasant memories.
+We do not fail to notice the beauty of the thought that those who are
+taken from us are not lost, but only gone before. And so it is in the
+life of a nation. If one were depicting the life of the nation for the
+last 50 year’s one would speak of the happiness that the great bulk of
+the population enjoyed.
+
+I have lived through the Chartist Riots, the Irish Famine, and the Cotton
+Famine, which tried the endurance of our artisans in the manufacturing
+districts, and caused in the minds of statesmen and of every thinking man
+the great apprehensions as to its bearing upon the industry and wealth
+and happiness of the country. I have lived through periods of war—the
+Crimean War, when the thoughts of everyone were directed to our Army in
+distress barely holding its own through that dreadful winter—and the
+Indian Mutiny. All these incidents in the life of a nation answer to the
+troubles and afflictions in the life of the individual. We have survived
+the troubles which faced us, and how can I do more than say that thoughts
+such as these remind us of our duties as Citizens, as individuals, as
+members of the great community, showing us how much we have to be
+thankful for and how much we are dependent on circumstances.
+
+ * * * * *
+
+ FINIS.
+
+ [Picture: Map of Whittlesey Mere, from “Fenland Notes & Queries.”]
+
+
+
+
+FOOTNOTES
+
+
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+paragraphs. In such cases the illustrations have been moved onto the
+following page, and the pages numbers in the list of illustrations have
+been changed accordingly. The filenames for the illustrations are their
+original page numbers.—DP.
+
+
+
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