The Old Pike / A History of the National Road, with Incidents, Accidents, and Anecdotes Thereon

by Thomas B. Searight

Stages and Stage Drivers continued—Gen. Taylor approaching Cumberland—Early Coaches—The first Troy Coach on the Road—Mr. Reeside and Gen. Jackson—John Buck—Accidents—Kangaroo and Bob-tail Teams—John Mills and William Bishop—Celebration at Cumberland—David Bonebraker, Hanson Willison, and a long list of other old drivers—Billy Willis and Peter Burdine—Fare Rates—The Way Bill—The Landlords—Pilot and Pioneer Lines—Compensation of Stage Drivers—Hopwood’s Row—Withdrawal of the lines—The dignity of stage drivers, estimated by an old pike boy.

Scharts’ history of Western Maryland gives the following account of President Taylor’s ride over the mountain division of the road, when on his way to Washington to be inaugurated:

“President Taylor and his party were, in 1849, conveyed over the road under the marshalship of that most indefatigable Whig, Thomas Shriver, who, with some other Cumberlanders, proceeded to the Ohio river and met the presidential party. Among the party were statesmen, politicians, and office-hunters, notably Col. Bullet, a brilliant editor from New Orleans, who was to occupy a relation to President Taylor something like that of Henry J. Raymond to Lincoln. The road was a perfect glare of ice, and everything above ground was literally plated with sleeted frost. The scenery was beautiful; to native mountaineers too common to be of much interest, but to a Southerner like Gen. Taylor, who had never seen the like, it was a phenomenon. In going down a spur of Meadow Mountain, the presidential coach, with the others, danced and waltzed on the polished road, first on one side and then on the other, with every sign of an immediate capsize, but the coaches were manned with the most expert of the whole corps of drivers. Shriver was in the rear, and in the greatest trepidation for the safety of the President. He seemed to feel himself responsible for the security of the head of the Nation. Down each hill and mountain his bare head could be seen protruding through the window of his coach to discover if the President’s coach was still upon wheels. The iron gray head of the General could almost with the same frequency be seen outside of his window, not to see after anybody’s safety, but to look upon what seemed to him an arctic panorama. After a ride of many miles the last long slope was passed and everything was safe. At twilight the Narrows were reached, two miles west of Cumberland, one of the boldest and most sublime views on the Atlantic slope. Gen. Taylor assumed authority and ordered a halt, and out he got in the storm and snow and looked at the giddy heights on either side of Wills creek, until he had taken in the grandeur of the scenery. He had beheld nothing like it before, even in his campaigns in Northern Mexico. The President-elect was tendered a reception on his arrival at Cumberland, and the next morning he and his party left on the cars for Washington.”

At an early day there was a coach factory at or near the Little Crossings, where many of the first passenger coaches used on the road were made. They were without thorough braces, or springs of any kind. Their bodies were long, and the inside seats for passengers placed crosswise. They had but one door, and that was in the front, so that passengers on entering were compelled to climb over the front seats to reach those in the rear.

The first coach of the Troy pattern was placed on the road in the year 1829 by James Reeside, and tradition has it that he won this coach with a bet on Gen. Jackson’s election to the presidency. Mr. Reeside was desirous that Gen. Jackson should be the first person to ride in this coach, and accordingly tendered it to the President-elect when on his way to Washington, who true to his habit of refusing gifts, declined the proffered compliment as to himself, but consented that his family might occupy the coach. Charley Howell was the driver, and his team was one of the finest on the road. Many coaches were brought out on the road afterward from the Troy and Concord factories. These coaches cost between five and six hundred dollars each.

John Buck was one of the oldest and best stage drivers on the road. He lived in Washington, Pennsylvania, and drove on the old line in the life-time of Daniel Moore, and was a great favorite of that ancient stage proprietor. When Lafayette visited Washington in 1825, Mr. Moore was active and prominent in arranging for his reception at that place, and assigned John Buck to drive the coach in which the illustrious visitor entered the town. It was a proud day for the old driver, who shared with the hero of the occasion, the plaudits of the people. Buck subsequently became the senior member of the firm of Buck, Lyon & Wolf, contractors, who built most of the locks and dams on the Muskingum river, in the State of Ohio. This old firm was called the “Menagerie Company,” on account of the names of its members.

THE NARROWS.

William Robinson (not “Billy”) suffered an “upset” at Somerfield, in 1832, with a full load of passengers going west. The stage coach had but one door, and to bring up the door side to the Endsley tavern, in Somerfield, it was necessary to wheel around. Robinson turned his team with such rapidity as to overturn the coach, and the passengers were all tumbled out in a pile, but none of them were seriously hurt. Wash. Alridge threw a coach over on the Conway hill, near Somerfield, inflicting a severe spinal injury upon a passenger who lived in Cincinnati. The sufferer was cared for at the tavern in Jockey Hollow, kept at the time by Aaron Wyatt. The stage company (old line) paid the injured passenger a considerable sum in damages, without suit. A passenger by the name of Merrill, of Indianapolis, had a leg broken by the upsetting of a coach at the turn of the road, above Somerfield; Samuel Jaco was the driver. William Roach, a well known driver, was killed in an “upset” at the Little Crossings bridge, about the year 1837. This seems to have been a different accident from that which occurred near the same place in 1835, related in the sketch of John Marker. Marker witnessed the accident of 1835, and states that the driver who was killed at that time was James Rhodes. David Stinson, an old driver, was killed by an “upset” on Woodcock Hill. Woodcock Hill is a short distance west of Thomas Brownfield’s old Mt. Augusta tavern, and is the highest peak on the road in Fayette county, Pennsylvania. Charley Howell upset in 1835, coming down the Winding Ridge Hill, and was badly hurt. He had a leg and arm broken, and was nursed at Connelly’s tavern, in Petersburg, for many months before he recovered.