Coaching Days

The following two pages have been abstracted from the exhibition mounted by the Yateley Society at the Yateley May Fayre in 1997

THE EXETER ROAD

Until Hawley became a separate parish in 1838 Blackwater was in the Parish of Yateley. Where the Wish Stream runs into the River Blackwater the three counties of Surrey, Berkshire and Hampshire meet. Blackwater marks the precise point where the Great South Western Road enters the Kingdom of Wessex. It has always been a border crossing. Imagine travelling in the olden days from Staines to Basingstoke.... Go back to Doomsday; clear everything off the map; draw in two rivers the Thames and the Wey. Between these rivers with their habitation there was nothing except heathland -- and Chobham, which was off the main road. North of the road was Windsor Forest, with its forest laws, and south was Chobham Common. Blackwater was exactly half way between the two ancient towns of Staines and Basingstoke, about 15 miles each way. From Egham to Blackwater there was barren heath. Except for small settlements developing along the road, the land stayed barren like this until about 1800. If it wasn‘t the highwaymen, it was miles from anywhere if your wheel came off. So imagine the relief of travellers when they crossed the ford into Hampshire and found its comfortable inns and smithy.

By the time of the great days of the stage coach, a surprisingly short twenty years or so before 1836, a network of relays had developed along the road about every four or five miles. You can still drive the A30 today and see these great coaching inns and the villages that developed around them: Sunninghill, Bagshot, Hartley Row, Murrell Green, Hook and Hatch. You can still see some of the great inns such as the White Lyon at Hartfordbridge, and the White Hart at Hook. The great Wellesley Arms at Murrell Green, once the first overnight stop for Exeter coaches from London, disappeared shortly after being left obsolete when the railways reaching Basingstoke by 1840.

Blackwater survived the coming of the railway since it had it own station. It also had something unique, the Blackwater Fair, held every November 8th. Blackwater was virtually at another crossroads, at the eastern end of the Welsh Drive, and just a mile or so off the Maultway. These ancient drove roads, crossing common land with its free grazing, enabled the drovers to bring their stock for sale before the winter set in. As a fair authorised by Royal Charter the Blackwater Fair enjoyed the ancient right that beer could be brewed and sold without licence.

Coaches and Inns

So by 1830, right in the heyday of the stage coach, Yateley village had one inn but Blackwater had three: the Swan, the Red Lion and the White Hart.