In this second part, we learn about early travel by stage in Maryland. Again, the information is from the Maryland Geological Survey (1899).

A glimpse at the methods of transportation in Maryland towards the beginning of this [nineteenth] century, before the turnpikes had been completed, might go far to dispel any illusions as to the “good old times,” of which so much is often heard.

Stage-lines indeed there were, and had been, since 1765, in which year the first line of stage-vessels and wagons was set up to go once a week from Philadelphia to Baltimore by way of Christiana and French-town on [the] Elk river.* In 1785 the Maryland Legislature granted G. P. Van Home an exclusive right to keep stage-carriages “on the publick road from the river Susquehannah to the river Patowmack,” and five years later Robert Hodgson and James Thompson were granted the sole and exclusive permission to set up a stage-line from the Delaware boundary, via Chestertown, to Gresham College on the bayside in Kent county by the great public road on the Eastern Shore, and were also given a right, not exclusive, to run stages from North Point to Baltimore Town. This route seems to have been popular, though stress of weather often made delay in crossing the [Chesapeake] Bay unavoidable. These stages started regularly from Mr. Grant’s tavern in Baltimore every Monday, Wednesday, and Friday morning and at six o’clock on the same days from Mr. James Thompson’s at the Indian Queen, Fourth Street, Philadelphia.**

Another favorite route was by packet up the Chesapeake and Delaware bays, using land transportation only across the peninsula. This was a very old and popular route, perhaps because it took less time. It was not long before rival companies sprang up, one between Frenchtown and Newcastle, and the other from Cecil Court House to Newcastle.***

Very many other stage-lines were afterwards opened. In 1790 one was advertised between Baltimore and Annapolis. The trip was made three times a week, the price being 10s. during the summer season, including fourteen pounds of baggage.**** There were also many stage-lines from the western country.

The vehicle in which one ventured upon such a journey has been minutely described. The coach was a sort of wagon on springs, an open carriage, with a top to it made of boards; and on each side, and at the ends, curtains, to be let down, baize on the inside, and a sort of canvas on the outside, tied with leather ties to the supporters of the top, on the sides and at the bottom, catching on a sort of stud like that of a single-horse chaise apron. The coach has three seats within the carriage and one the coachman sits on before. Thus it carries twelve people, three on each seat, as two passengers ride by the side of the coachman; but the mail-coach carries only nine passengers, the mail lying in the inside of the coach.

* John F. Watson’s Annals of Philadelphia was published in 1830.

** This according to the newspapers of the period – The Maryland Journal and Baltimore Advertiser – July 22, 1791.

*** Also noted in the local newspapers (same as above), March 22, 1791.

**** And again from the same newspapers, April 1790.