Carriages & Coaches: Their History & Their Evolution

by Ralph Straus

Another open carriage which remained popular until the introduction of automobiles is the phaeton. Sir Walter Gilbey mentions several varieties. Of these the largest seems to have been the mail phaeton.

“It was a favourite carriage,” he writes, “seventy years ago or more, and was frequently used by gentlemen for long posting journeys in England and on the Continent. In these days this carriage was always built with a perch, the undercarriage resembling that of a coach, whence its name. For a time elliptical springs were adopted, but during the last ten years the fashionable mail phaeton has been a solid-looking square-bodied vehicle on its old undercarriage.”

In 1889, he also observes that a jointed perch was used, the object being “to prevent the vehicle being twisted on bad roads, and also to preserve its equilibrium under trying conditions of roads.” The demi mail phaeton, to which Sir Walter gives the credit of having ousted the ugly perch high phaeton from public favour, “derives its names from the peculiar arrangement of the springs in the construction of the undercarriage.” Another variety, the Beaufort phaeton, is large enough to carry six people, and was, in the first place, expressly designed to carry people to the meet. Yet another modification, the Stanhope phaeton, invented by the peer of that name, is smaller than the last-mentioned, and has achieved a world-wide popularity. “The head and apron render it suitable for winter work, and when the hood is thrown back the stanhope is an admirable vehicle for summer use whether in town or country.” The T-cart is a smaller stanhope “with compassed rail and sticked body in front and a seat for the groom behind.” Sir Walter records the fact that its greatest popularity was about 1888, after which it was supplanted by the spider phaeton—a “tilbury body on four wheels with a small seat for the groom supported on branched irons behind.”

It would be possible to mention half a dozen other varieties of the phaeton,[59] but such a list is best relegated to a coachbuilder’s catalogue. There is only one innovation which should not be allowed to pass unnoticed here. Many of the phaeton bodies during the ’sixties were constructed of basket-work; indeed, Croydon, where lived the inventor, received all the benefits which a new industry brings in its trail, but the popularity of these basket-carriages waned as rapidly as it had waxed—due, according to one writer, to the ridicule heaped upon them by Punch. A revival was attempted in 1886, and “we have a reminiscence of it in the imitation cane-work painted on the panels of many carriages” at a still later date.[60]

We come to the closed carriages.

The brougham was undergoing about as many changes and improvements as fell to the lot of any other carriage, yet superficially it maintained much the same appearance. The coupé brougham so popular to-day is the relic of the old chariot.[61] Of its several varieties the best-known is, or rather was—for it is rarely, if ever, seen now—the clarence. “It was introduced,” says Sir Walter, “about the year 1842 by Messrs. Laurie and Marner, of Oxford Street, and has fairly been described as “midway between a brougham and a coach.” It had very curved and rather fanciful lines, seated four persons inside, and was entered by one step from the ground, carried the coachman and footman on a low driving seat, and was used with a lighter pair of horses than the family coach.” Certain models, however, show the driver’s seat to have been high, on a level, that is to say, with the roof; and not long after the first clarence was designed, Lytton Bulwer caused to be built what was called a Surrey clarence, which possessed a hammercloth. The attempt, however, to produce a miniature chariot did not succeed. Another variety, named uncomfortably the dioropha, was shown at the Great Exhibition of 1851.[62] Here the side windows would slide up and down upon a new principle, and “the whole upper part of the body from the elbow-line could be lifted from the lower, leaving a barouche body.” You were shown models of this upper portion hanging rather forlornly from the roof of a coach-house. But improvements in the landau caused the extinction of the dioropha, which does not seem to have been built after 1875. The amempton, invented by a Mr. Kesterton, was a smaller form of this carriage. The one-horse “growler” or “four-wheeler,” by the way, which still wanders up and down the streets of London, is the lineal descendant of the clarence.

Of the more unconventional four-wheeled carriages, the waggonette seems to have been introduced about 1845 by the Prince Consort after a German model, though one writer gives the credit of the design to the Prince himself. Here, as every one knows, the seats faced each other at right-angles to the driver’s seat, the door being at the back. At first they were built very large—to carry out the original intention of providing a family carriage which should really be worthy of the name. Afterwards smaller models were produced, and proved equally popular. “The principle of riding sideways,” remarks Thrupp, “was not new. The Irish car, the four-wheeled Inside car of the Westmorland district, the old Break, and the Omnibus all contributed to the design of the modern vehicle.” A few particular varieties may be mentioned. The now forgotten perithron, a Suffolk invention, was a waggonette in which the driving seat was bisected down its centre, so as to allow a passenger entering from the back to reach the front seat. The Portland waggonette, built for the Duke of Portland in 1893, was a large carriage with a folding hood. Another carriage of the kind with a folding leather hood was presented by Lord Lonsdale to the King and Queen at the time of their wedding. This is known as a Lonsdale waggonette. “Lord Lonsdale,” remarks Sir Walter Gilbey, “allowed his name to be given to this device under the impression that he was the first to originate a head of this description; but his claim for invention of it was disputed at the time. Mr. Robertson stated that he had built such a waggonette so far back as 1864; Mr. Kinder had built one in 1865; and Messrs. Morgan stated that they had turned out a similar vehicle before the year 1870.” A very large waggonette, the brake, is a common enough object to-day, and is built in various forms. Sometimes a second seat is placed directly behind and parallel to the driver’s seat. In some models these seats stretch back throughout the length of the carriage, in which case it is a char-à-banc. Awnings, permanent or temporary, are generally provided.

In America the commonest four-wheeled carriage is the light wagon or buggy, a name given in England to a light two-wheeled, single-seated cart (also called a sulky[63]) towards the end of the eighteenth century. The buggy has one seat fixed on to a long, shallow tray; the wagon is similar, but has two or more seats.

“These American waggons,” says Thrupp, “were modelled from the old German waggon, but they have been so much improved as to be scarcely recognised. The distinctive feature of the German waggon was a light, shallow tray, suspended above a slight perch carriage on two grasshopper springs placed horizontally and parallel with and above the front and hind axle-tree; on the tray one or two seats were placed, the whole was light and inexpensive, and well adapted to a new, rough country without good roads. These waggons may still be found in Germany and Switzerland....

“American ingenuity was lavished upon these waggons, and they have arrived at a marvel of perfection in lightness. The two grasshopper springs have been replaced with two elliptical springs. The perch, axle-trees, and carriage timbers have been reduced to thin sticks. The four wheels are made so slender as to resemble a spider’s web; in their construction of the wheels the principle of the patent rim used in England in 1790 has been adopted. Instead of five, six, or seven felloes to each wheel, there are only two, of oak or hickory wood, bent to the shape by steam. The ironwork of the American buggy is very slender, yet composed of many pieces, and, in order to reduce the cost, these pieces of iron are mostly cast, not forged, of a sort of iron less brittle than our cast iron.... The weight of the whole waggon is so small that one man can lift it upon its wheels again if accidentally upset, and two persons of ordinary strength can raise it easily from the ground. The four wheels are nearly of the same height, and the body is suspended centrally between them. There are no futchels; the pole or shafts are attached to the front axle-tree bed, and the front of the pole is carried by the horses just as they carry the shafts; the splinter-bar and whipple-trees are attached to the pole on swivels. Some are made without hoods and some with hoods. These are made so that the leather of the sides can be taken off and rolled up, and the back leather removed, rolled, or fixed at the bottom, a few inches away from the back, the roof remaining as a sunshade....

“The perfection to which the American buggy or waggon has been carried, and every part likely to give way carefully strengthened, is marvellous. Those made by the best builders will last a long time without repair. The whole is so slender and elastic that it ‘gives’—to use a trade term—and recovers itself at any obstacle. The defect in English eyes of these carriages consists in the difficulty of getting in or out by reason of the height of the front wheel, and its proximity to the hind wheel—it is often necessary partly to lock round the wheel to allow of easy entrance. There is also a tremulous motion on a hard road which is not always agreeable. It is not surprising that, with the great advantages of extreme lightness, ease, and durability, and with lofty wheels, the American waggons travel with facility over very rough roads, and there is a great demand for them in our colonies. It must be remembered that the price is small, less than the price of our gigs and four-wheeled dog-carts.”