Goes out to Heytesbury, Westbury, Devizes, Trowbridge, Bradford, Bath, Bristol, Warminster, Frome, Shepton Mallet, Wells, etc., etc., Sunday at Ten at Night; and Wednesday and Friday at Six in the Evening.
Comes in from Portsmouth, Gosport, Isle of Wight, Guernsey, Jersey, Southampton, New Forest, Winton, Romsey, on Sunday, Wednesday and Friday, at Six in the Evening.
Goes out to Romsey, Winton, New Forest, Southampton, Guernsey, Jersey, Isle of Wight, Gosport, Portsmouth, on Sunday, Tuesday, and Thursday at Eleven in the Morning.
The official bag seal of the period was inscribed thus:—
The Bristol and Portsmouth Mail Coach was established under the immediate superintendence of Francis Freeling, Secretary to the General Post Office, who travelled on the coach on its first journey about the year 1786.
In the year 1793 the Salisbury, Portsmouth, and Chichester mails went out from Bristol every morning at seven, and arrived in Bristol every evening between nine and eleven. At that period the coaches from Bristol for the Southern Counties started thus:—Bush Tavern, Corn Street, John Weeks; for Weymouth a post coach every Monday, Wednesday, and Friday morning at 5; for Portsmouth a post coach every Tuesday, Thursday, and Saturday morning at four, so that probably the mail which left at 7 a.m. daily was carried by mail cart and postboy.
In about the year 1798 a "long" coach set out from Mr. Crosse's, the Crown Inn, Portsmouth, to Southampton, Salisbury, Bath, and Bristol, every Monday, Wednesday, and Friday afternoon; and from Gosport every Tuesday, Thursday, and Saturday, to the White Hart Inn, Bristol.
The methods of service in 1798 and the perils of the road are indicated by the following public notice, viz.:—