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Monday 7 November 2011

Risking a Stagecoach Jounrey, 1837: Travel Tuesday

Regular readers of my blog know that I enjoy looking through old newspapers in my local archive centre in the Scottish Borders. The papers are full of titbits of information that throw  a fascinating picture on life at the time. 

Here is an account of a stagecoach accident, reported in "The Kelso Chronicle"
 of 16th June 1837.  It gives a graphic picture of the perils facing our ancestors in travelling by stagecoach.
BERWICK
"ACCIDENT. – On Tuesday evening when the coach from Kelso had passed Ord, the reins broke, and the driver left his seat, and went along the pole to recover them. His foot slipped, and he fell between the pole and the horses to the ground. Fortunately, the wheels passed on both sides of him, and he escaped with no other injury than a slight blow to the head.
The horses set off at rapid pace, and ran through Tweedmouth. The passengers kept their seats, and the horses while running furiously along the bridge, were stopped by a young man named Robert Robertson, who, with great personal risk, seized the horses’ head.
Had they not been stopped, in all probability, from the speed with which they were proceeding, the coach would have been upset at the turn of Bridge Street.  The conduct of the young man deserves great praise.”


Travel Tuesday is a blogging prompt from www.geneabloggers.com to encourage writers to record their local and family history.

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