More Dirt and Foulness in 17th Century London by Katherine Pym

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Later model of Coach with Seat-Box higher & safer

Riding in a coach sounds romantic. I certainly would like to climb into a 17^th century ‘chariot’ as Pepys says on occasion. It would be cool. 

I’ve read a few historical fiction novels where the hero seduces the heroine in a carriage as it rolls down a neat cobblestone lane, the coach lanterns slightly swaying. The visual is pretty. It is clean. Flowers scent the air. Unfortunately, some things in these novels aren’t quite correct. 

Most of the middling sort of society did not own horses and until the latter half of Queen Elizabeth I’s reign, my sources say there were no coaches (carts, yes). Everyday folk  foot-slogged wherever they wanted to go. When they finally came onto the scene, you had to be rich to own one. 

Coaches of the late 16^th & early 17^th centuries were not like what we see in movies and television. They were heavy, cumbersome boxes attached to solid frames with wheels. They made for a teeth rattling trip.  

Sometimes leather flaps covered the windows. When doors were attached, they were generally ill-fitted. Cold, rain and dirt found their way inside. Travel was uncomfortable and unwieldy. Eventually, the heavy coach was suspended by great leather straps but the swaying this produced caused terrible motion sickness.  

17th century Coachman

During most of the 17^th century, the coach had no box-seat. The coachman was forced to sit or stand on a low platform attached to the coach pole. If he sat, there was no place to rest his feet. This put his head very close to the horses’ hooves where a coachman could easily be kicked or splattered with mud and waste. The coachman’s foot could snag a root or an object and be pulled under the chassis, breaking a leg.

If you think of a coachman and postilions in plush livery with lace and shiny boots as they jaunt down a country lane, don’t. They would be mud splattered, the lace, their faces, hats and clothes fouled by the time they reached their destination.

The old Roman roads were in disrepair. Other highways were mud tracks or scratched paths. In springtime, farmers plowed across roads then people, carts and horses brazenly trod over this, crushing seed and new growth. Wheel ruts were deep. Great holes pockmarked thoroughfares that could break a horse’s leg, do irreparable damage to a cart or coach. 

Coach with low, unsafe seat-box

The actual city of London resided within its walls, an area of approximately one square mile. Everything beyond was considered the Liberties or suburbs. City lanes were narrow. As years went by coaches were built taller, wider. (Seat boxes were placed higher, equipped with foot rests.)Their sides and roofs scraped along cantilever houses, destroyed the edges of jutting eaves, knocked off butchers’ displays of hanging meats, pushed over vegetable stands. In London, iron clad wheels were outlawed due to the ear splitting noise and road destruction, but for the most part, this law was ignored.

By 1636, it is suggested upwards to 6,000 coaches rumbled up and down the lanes of London, (which seems excessively over the mark). Gridlock! Another source stated 300-700, which is still pretty darn crowded.  

Coaches fought with pedestrians, merchants with loaded carts, sedan chairs and men and women on horses. They rolled down lanes that were a combination of pavers, cobblestones and dirt, piles of muck and filthy mud running down center kennels. [Men were allowed to urinate on fires and empty their bladders in the street.] Cattle and sheep were herded through town. There were no fenders on the coach wheels. This allowed mud and other foul substances to wash onto the coachman and passengers.

Waterman plying his trade on the Thames

Another mode of dirty travel:

Watermen plied their boats for hire up and down the River Thames. They had a strong guild. They were tough and ornery. You never wanted to cross a wherriman. When they were pressed into service during the 2^nd Anglo/Dutch war, soldiers were sent to keep them subdued. Considering the crush of coaches in London, taking a wherry where you wanted to go probably proved to be much faster.

But there were issues. The Thames is a tidal river. When the tide was out, oftentimes you had to walk to the boat on planks of wood spread over mud that held centuries of filth.  London Bridge on the Southwark side of the river held heads of beheaded traitors on pikes. Once the flesh was eaten away, the caretaker would fling the skulls off the Bridge where they sank into river mud.  

The river was used for suicides. Men and women jumped off the Bridge to land willy-nilly on anything flowing beneath. Bodies would bloat up and float for days before the city scavengers could retrieve them. Dogs and rats had a tendency to find their way there, too, where they’d be left to rot.  

The Thames was also a dumping ground, from the Fleet River that was a sewer to anyone who wanted to get rid of something. Your wherriman guided the boat through this sludge to your destination.

Then there was the sedan chair.

Like a fly or a gnat, these little guys buzzed underfoot and added to the congestion. Cramped and closed in, it was a cleaner way to travel once you got into the chair.

Attached by two hefty poles, men at each end of the chair carried you to where you wanted to go. They were the ones who got dirty during the journey, not you, unless somehow a man tripped and the whole chair fell to the ground. I don’t want to go into all the hazards this would cause especially if it had been raining. 

Sedan Chair carried by mules. Nifty way to go.

So, no matter what you did in the 17^th century, where you went in London, prepare to get dirty. If you go back in time, go with an open mind.

You’ll find yourself in a rollicking loud place, filled with all sorts of people. Your mind will stagger from the myriad of visuals and powerful scents. Just hope you can safely return to the present where you can take a bath in warm, clean water.

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Many thanks to:

Wikicommons, public domain for sedan chairs

Other pictures taken from the book Travel in England, 1925

Travel in England in the 17^th century by Joan Parkes, Oxford University Press, London 1925

Old and New London: Westminster and the western suburbs By Walter Thornbury, Edward Walford, Vol IV, London 1891

Beware the Most Dangerous Animal in the Jungle...by Stuart R. West

Of course I'm talking about the great lumbering beast: the American Ox. Otherwise known as myself.

Click for comic mystery antics.

 I don't camp. Never have, never will. Nature and I don't get along. If I so much as glance at poison ivy, I turn into a giant blister bubble. On the other hand, my wife loves camping and nature. Everything that is nature except for...the unspeakable eight-legged critters. She suffers from a truly bad case of arachnophobia. 

My wife (kinda, sorta) avoiding arachnids in the jungle (what she doesn't know won't kill her.)

Over the course of our trip, several people thought they could cure my wife's fears easy-peasy with some Dr. Phil nonsense: "Oh, the best way to conquer your fear is to face it." Someone else tried the routine of "no, no, spiders are good! They bla, bla, bla..." While their intentions were good, they've never witnessed my wife jump out of a moving car once she spotted a spider. While she was driving. Twice.

So, for obvious reasons, people thought we were crazy for going to the jungle.

My wife, um, enjoying the floor.

Me, I possess the grace of a big, clumsy meth-head trying to thread a needle. Getting in and out of the boat proved extremely problematic. Our guide, Victor--an amiable sort, fluent in English and bird-song--grew weary of my (literally) rocking the boat. Constantly, he told me to "slow down, slow down." But he didn't understand speed was the only way I kept from falling, sheer momentum my only ally. Amazingly, I didn't capsize the boat, but I capsized myself a couple of times. 

Victor standing at ease and defying gravity in our boat.

Once, Victor wanted to redistribute weight throughout the boat so he instructed me to move back a bench. I'd successfully moved myself back before by just using my arms and swinging my body backward, so I thought I could do it again. Methinks I'd forgotten the 50 pound backpack attached to my body. I fell between the benches, legs up in the air like half-price day at the old-West brothel. A particularly poor day to wear white pants (and what was I thinking wearing white pants into the jungle anyway? Terrible fashion choice.). 

A good larf was had by all (except for me and my wounded pride. Not to mention my wounded posterior).

Falling isn't anything new for me. Gravity and balance are not my friends. While escorting us across wooden planks to the local jungle health clinic, Victor remarked on one of our cohorts' very good balance. I said, "I think she has better balance than me." 

Victor readily agreed. "Much better," he said. "Much, much better."

Of COURSE nature just loves Victor.

So there I am, floundering around in the jungle, trying my damnedest not to fall on snakes or worse, planting my feet ploddingly, arms out like a new-born tyke learning to walk. Hardly jungle material.

Back to that health clinic... The Yanamano Clinic--a small, humid building just off the river--is run by a doctor from Wisconsin and services the locals (or at least those who've embraced Western medicine). The doctor, understandably frustrated by the government's lack of aid, caring and health care, ripped through a list of her recent patients and their alarming ailments. Needless to say, machete wounds topped the list. A sobering (and sweltering) visit, it truly made me grateful for what we take for granted in the States.

Solar-powered (and without air conditioning, natch), the small operating room was a sparsely lit hot-box where the doctor sweats over her patients while sewing them up. Recently, a fan had been installed (a huge deal) and a bright light bulb had been donated (again, victory). Doctors Without Borders swung by one day with good intentions and big ideas, but little could truly be done. It's a very bleak situation for both the locals and the doctors because help doesn't come from many places. And the locals are uneducated about their own ailments and what modern medicine can do for them. 

Later, I was told this was one of the better clinics. At least there weren't holes in the ceiling.

On the way out of the clinic, I made a big mistake, a huge one.

As we left the clinic, I held the door open for everyone because Mom taught me to be a gentleman. Our boat driver, Walker, glared menacingly at me as he slowly walked through my proffered opened door. Victor, our guide, actually stopped dead in his tracks, stared at me. He opened his mouth to say something, then shook his head and hurried through the door. Hands flailing, they chatted animatedly and angrily back to our boat. Clearly I'd done something to offend them.

Only later did I realize my whoopsie moment. 

The culture of Peru is muy machismo. Men are men and the very mention of a "metrosexual" will get you beat up. Men drive motokars and women work in the kitchen, end of story. However, the men are fooling themselves, for women truly rule the roost. It's a very sexist culture, but only superficially so. Regardless, men take their manly manliness very manfully.

Things weren't right between Victor and myself until the end of the trip.

Friendsies again! (L to R: My wife, Victor, me, Jungle Momma Connie)

On the bright side, my wife had only one minor spider incident. In the boat, she reflexively kicked our friend's butt to get rid of a small, menacing arachnid. (I purposefully didn't tell my love about the lodge's four pet tarantulas until we'd left). Not bad odds for the jungle!

Speaking of odds, what're the odds Wendell Worthy can race against time to save his brother's life by running through downtown Kansas City in his underwear? Not very good! Find out in my comic thriller, Chili Run.

Laughs and thrills just a click away!