19. Stage Line 



to Washington 



The trip described here, from Philadelphia to 

 Washington, may have occurred early in 1832. 

 The railroad from New Castle, on the Delaware, 

 to Frenchtown, below Elkton on the Elk River, 

 was opened for horse-drawn traffic in 1 83 1 ; 

 locomotives were placed on the road in 1832. 173 

 When the rivers were open for navigation, the 

 traveler boarded a steamboat in Philadelphia, 



steamed down the Delaware to New Castle, 

 changed to horse cars which took him overland to 

 Frenchtown, and in another steamboat continued 

 his passage down the Elk River, across Chesapeake 

 Bay, and up the Patapsco River to Baltimore. 

 In winter, the only public conveyances available 

 were stagecoaches or, as in the present case, open- 

 front sleighs. 



Trom the commencement of the New York and 

 Erie Canal by the State in 181 7 until its completion, 

 it was looked at with no little jealousy by the Middle 

 and Seaboard Southern States, because, if successful, 

 it would change the stream of immigration through 

 them that was at that time peopling the valleys of the 

 great western rivers. It was therefore not surprising 

 that the question of maintaining their position made 

 that of internal improvement in transportation the 

 paramount one of the day. I remember well that this 

 was almost the absorbing subject of conversation 

 among all classes. Steamboats on the rivers had done 

 much; still more was required .... 



What Philadelphian, whose recollection extends 

 back over a period of fifty years, does not remember 

 the streams of produce-loaded great Conestoga wagons 

 with their high, hooped white canvas covers or roofs, 

 drawn by teams of four or six horses, that poured over 

 the Lancaster pike into the city? These, in seasons of 

 hard, dry roads, to avoid the payment of toll, came 

 by way of the West Chester or other dirt roads, leaving 

 in their wake for miles and miles clouds of almost 

 impenetrable dust. These great wagons, backed to 



1,3 Bulletin of the Railway and Locomotive Historical Society (1935), 

 no - 38. pp. 60-61. See also U.S. Treasury Department's 

 "Report on the Steam-Engines in the United States," H. Ex. 

 Doc. 21, 25th Cong., 3d sess., pp. 9, 198. 



144 



the curb on both sides of Market Street — the main 

 thoroughfare of the city and one of its widest streets — 

 their poles all slewed to an angle of some 45 , pointing 

 in the same direction; the great feeding trough, that 

 was carried hung on the back of the wagon, affixed on 

 the pole, with horses on either side, feeding; turning 

 many blocks of the main street into a horse stable, 

 leaving scarce passing room for vehicles between this 

 Cheval-de-jrise of wagon poles. At that time, with the 

 exception of the commerce on the rivers, the entire 

 produce of the country and return merchandise was 

 moved in road-wagons by horse-power. 



The journey from Philadelphia to Pittsburgh in the 

 fast mail coach was a fearful undertaking of three 

 days and two nights. Six passengers were cramped 

 in a coach, with mail pouches filling all proper leg 

 room. Rather more comfort was to be had in the 

 slower nine-passenger coach. 174 



The journey from New York to Washington was no 

 mean undertaking, though, when navigation was 



171 VV. Hassell Wilson, in his "Notes on the Internal Im- 

 provements of Pennsylvania" (Philadelphia, 1879, reprinted 

 from articles in Railway World in 1878), p. 32, mentioned an 

 1 83 1 announcement in Pittsburgh newspapers of the "Reeside, 

 Slaymaker & Co." express stage, seating six passengers, making 

 the trip from Pittsburgh to Philadelphia in 2'» days, and a 

 slower stage requiring four days. 



