Related Articles
The west Dorset village recently played host to Diana Faust from Los Angeles who discovered that her grandfather was William Stephens, an Exeter mail-coach man, who ran the Mail Coach Inn in Charmouth in the early 1800s.
She was visiting the England on a genealogy research expedition/researching to write a book on her ancestor’s history.
She already gained information from Charmouth Local History Society’s website.
Joining Diana on the visit was Richard Hopkins, another of William Stephens’ descendants.
They were made welcome by Mary Saunders, representing the Charmouth Local History Society who guided them round the village. They were later joined by Helen Parker, the present day owner of “Little Lodge”, once owned by William, and were able to see a number of documents with his signature.
The highlight was the Coach and Horses Inn, where their ancestor had been landlord. Sadly the building today is not the original, as that was lost in a devastating fire in 1882 in the thatched roof.
After their visit to Charmouth they spent further time following William Stephens’ trail to Axminster and eventually Exeter.
The Coach and Horses pub in Charmouth, formerly the Mail Coach Inn and before that the Three Kings, played a key part in Dorset’s coaching era.
This is the era that Charles Dickens portrayed so vividly in the Pickwick Papers and the pub in Charmouth could so well have been the model for that chosen by him.
This period of history coincided with the introduction of the Royal Mail at the end of the 18th century and was to quickly decline with the growth of the railway.
William Stephens arrived in Charmouth in 1812, aged 28, with his wife, Ann and their two children, William and Ann.
They had moved from Exeter, where he had held the position of an Exeter Mail Coachman for over five years.
He would have been responsible for driving the mail coach and transporting letters between post offices.
William also had responsibility for ensuring the horses were well-maintained and properly fed and groomed.
He would have known Charmouth well as he regularly passed through it en route to Dorchester, Salisbury and London.
The position he took of landlord of the Coach and Horses had arisen when the previous gentleman holding the position, Joseph Bradbeer, took the postal business across the Street to Crouts and opened a Post Office and Stores there, which still trades today as a Nisa store.
At the back was a coach house and stables that were rented by and later bought by William Stephens.
Although he was to lease the inn, he was often described as a coachman and must have held the two roles, no doubt with assistance from his wife, Ann.
Charmouth is very fortunate in having an almost complete run of Poor Rate and Land Tax Lists in the early 19th century, which provide valuable information relating to their time in the village.
They were to have a further four children baptised there. Sadly, there is one lasting memorial to the family in the form of a grave stone at the rear of St. Andrews Church today, that records the death of their eldest son, William, aged just 9 in 1820.
William Stephens had a younger brother, John, who was also a Mail Coachman and joined him in 1821.
He was to meet and marry Catherine Tucker and were to have two children in the village. They were shown as renting no. 3 Manor House from Simeon Bullen, before moving on to the Woodyates Inn at Pentridge in Dorset.
It was William Edwards who inherited several properties in the village on the death of his grandmother, Hannah Newberry in 1788.
These included the Three Crowns Inn as well as the adjacent property, Beech House, where he lived and ran a Butchers.
He was later to change the name of the Inn to the Coach and Horses and rent it to William Stephens, who in due course was to make a success of it and in 1816 was able to purchase from Stephen Atkinson a Coach House and Orchard, which is now the site of the former Star Inn in Charmouth.
It was in 1821 that he retired from being an Exeter Mail coach-man and was to be honoured with a beautifully engraved silver salver, which is now preserved at the RAMM museum in Exeter with an equestrian portrait of him.
The coaches that would travel from London to Exeter after their stay at the Coach and Horses would continue their journey to the George Inn in Axminster.
It was there in 1822, that he was to take on the position of landlord.
William and Ann were to be blessed with two more daughters.
He still had his link with Charmouth with his ownership of the Coach House and in the same year, paid £390 for the neighbouring house and shop, known as Little Lodge from James Welch. He was to rent this to a number of tenants including Samuel Aplin, who ran a Haberdashery and Store there.
It was whilst William was in Axminster in 1827 that a devastating fire swept through the Coach House and Stables that he owned.
Soon after this setback he sold them to Lydia, the widow of Joseph Bradbeer, who ran the post Office and Stores in front of them on The Street. The George in Axminster was substantially larger than the Coach and Horses and attracted considerably more coaches than the former.
It gave William the opportunity to operate his own coaches. He was later to establish his own coach business and stables at 92 Sidwell Street in Exeter. The City at this time was the center for a number of Coaching Inns.
The most important of these was The New London Inn which was operated by John Cockram, who was married to William’s sister Ann.
It was in 1833, at the age of 50 that William was to move from Axminster to Exeter where he took on the lease of the Half Moon in the High Street.
Recommended reading:
It was also the year that he made the decision to cut his link with Charmouth with the sale of the house and shop, which is now Little Lodge for £425 to George Biddlecombe, a Linen Draper from Winsham in Somerset.
William was to make a great success of both the Inn and his coaching business as is shown by the regular adverts he took in the Exeter Flying Post.
Tragically his life was to be cut short in 1840 and his wife Ann was to carry on as Landlady at the Half Crown until her own death in 1853 and his son, John with the Coaching business.
With thanks to Neil Mattingly and the Charmouth Local History Society.
