Richard Martin

– Innkeeper and Postmaster

Published in Windlesora 05 (1986)

© WLHG

Some two hundred years ago Richard Martin became landlord of the New Inn which had been opened about fifteen years earlier at the junction of St Alban’s Street and Park Street. According to the annual register of victuallers compiled by the clerk of the Quarter Sessions Court he became licensee in 1771 (1). There were five or six inns in Windsor at this date and the New Inn, like the others, provided the venue for dinners enjoyed by the magistrates after the Quarter Sessions; payment for these are recorded in the Borough Chamberlain’s accounts. The earliest one at which Richard Martin was host took place at Michaelmas 1773 (2).

Similarly payments were paid in subsequent years until the year 1778/9 when payment was made to “Mr Marten (sic) at the Mermaid, Bill for wine and rum £2 13s 0d“.

Fig. l. Entry for Richard Martin in the Victualler’s Register, 1784, in the Windsor Session Book, 1750 – 1787

The New Inn had been only a stepping stone and by 1779 Richard Martin was innkeeper of the Mermaid and Castle, an ancient inn in a prominent position in the Market Place; it is now the Castle Hotel. Its history can be traced back to 1528 when it was one of the lesser inns in Windsor (3). Even a century later it had only nine rooms and occupied only part of the site of the 18th century inn. By the time Richard Martin became landlord it had been considerably enlarged and before the end of the century the whole of the High Street facade was covered with elegant cream stucco. It is uncertain when exactly these changes took place for no records have been found by which they can be dated and the architectural evidence is inconclusive. However the facade has been dated as late 18th century (4) and may well have been added during Richard Martin’s time as landlord; it is in keeping with other improvements wrought by this ambitious man.

For several years during the mid 18th century the name of the inn seems to have oscillated between the Mermaid, the Mermaid and Castle and the Castle, settling down as the Castle Inn about 1790, before becoming the Castle Hotel. Although the building has been extended in this century and given new windows and entrances on the first floor, it still shows an essentially Georgian face to the town.

Inns were an integral part of the coaching industry throughout the 18th and early 19th centuries. Those involved catered for all manner of vehicles from the small light postchaises to the carriers’ carts and the huge stage wagons. A great number were part of the stage coach network and an arched entrance and remains of old stabling is often given as evidence of a particular inn once being a coaching inn. However, although the Castle Hotel still has an 18th century stable and an early print (5) shows a suitable entrance into the inn yard, there is no evidence whatsoever that the Castle Inn was involved in the stage coach trade at this time. There were two coach offices in Windsor (6), neither associated with an inn, and most if not all the stage coach business was conducted through them. Richard Martin’s inn, however, was a posting house, hiring out postchaises and post horses to those wealthy enough to afford them. These vehicles were the taxis of the coaching era and cost three to four times as much as a stage coach. Posting houses were the cream of the country’s inns and were listed in the road books of the period (7), very much as AA and RAC recommended hotels are today. Only two are given for Windsor – the Castle and the White Hart, but it was Richard Martin, and not George Clode of the White Hart, who obtained the royal warrant to provide post horses for George III (8).

Fig. 2. Facade if the present Castle Hotel (drawn by Daphne Fido).

During the reigns of George I and George II Windsor Castle had been rarely used by the king and Court and years of neglect had made it quite unsuitable as a home for George III and his family. But from 1785 he made Windsor his chief place of residence and eventually the Castle was made habitable again. How soon Richard Martin was able to obtain the royal warrant hackneyman’ to the king is unknown for the relevant record has not survived, nor is it known how much business he contracted. Records of a later period, however, suggest that the position meant not only the remunerative hire of post horses by the royal family and their visitors, but also brought considerable prestige to the inn and extra business from the wealthier members of the public (9). It seems likely that the Castle Inn was now the foremost in the town, an opinion which seems to have been held by the compilers of the Universal British Directory who put the Castle Inn first in the list.

In 1786 Richard Martin was also appointed postmaster of Windsor (10). It was his responsibility to accept the letters brought to the inn and arrange for their delivery after they had been sorted. One of his own inn servants would have acted as letter carrier taking the mail to the houses in the town free of any extra charge, but collecting the postage due according to the mileage that the letter was carried by mail coach and horse post to Windsor. Delivery to houses beyond the confines of the town was at first in the discretion of the postmaster who could make an extra charge for this service. Many people, however, doubtless collected their letters and the London newspapers which came with the mail, or sent their servants. It seems likely that the Windsor postal district stretched as far as Slough and the villages to the north such as Stoke Poges and Wexham, and west of Windsor to St Leonards.

Richard Martin was also responsible for the collection and delivery of the mail bags to the mail coach at Maidenhead, the nearest postal town on the Bath and Bristol route (11). At first he may have sent one of his inn servants, but by 1792 Thomas Goddard of the White Hart Inn, Slough was being employed in this capacity. He was paid £30 per annum out of £32 13s 4d allowed to Richard Martin for this job. This was not a generous amount – but then the Post Office always paid as little as they could – and in the opinion of the Postmasters General Richard Martin should not have expected to retain much for his trouble. The £30 received by Goddard was scarcely sufficient, because, as he complained the duty cost him 12s per week as he had to keep a horse and a boy at Maidenhead every night. Even if Martin had paid the whole amount, however, it would have given Goddard only 11 1/2d over and above the 12s! In the summer of 1792 Thomas Goddard took on another job, that of collecting and delivering letters to Slough and the neighbouring villages; this appears to have been a penny postal scheme arranged by the Post Office. Goddard was not paid a salary, but merely allowed to charge a penny for each letter and newspaper. Unfortunately not all those who might be expected to use the service did so, and by August of the next year Goddard, at the suggestion of Richard Martin, had raised his fee to 2d per letter; but this was not a successful move and lost him more customers.

We do not know how this problem was solved, but meantime Richard Martin had his own problems. From January 1790 he had been obliged to deliver special pouches to my Lords the Postmasters General, Lord Chesterfield and Lord Walsingham who resided at Baylis House, just north of Slough, and Old Windsor respectively (12). An extra allowance of £20 seems to have been made for this duty but in 1794 he wrote to the Post Office complaining that he was out of pocket since he had to keep a men and horse especially to perform this service. He claimed a mere £10 per annum extra but this was too much according to the Post Office and on May 8th his son sent another letter on his behalf.

Sir

My Father received yours of the 5th ult and in answer to the Minute enclosed therein begs to say he returns their Lordships (the Postmr Genl) his most sincere thanks for the allowance therein made – and respecting the mans wages of £10 p annum being too much he submits to you a few words on the subject which is – He should not have kept a man but for the purpose of carrying the Bags to and from their Lordships and supposing for a moment (which by the way my Father very much doubts) that the man one day with the other might not be out more than 100 days in the year he must beg leave to inform you that on several of those days he was out three and four times and very often the whole day and exclusive of that his board and lodging with other trifling expenses could not possibly cost my father less than £20 or £25 p annum so that under all the circumstances he thinks himself fairly and justly entitled to the £10 p annum and shall not think himself satisfied with less than that sum.’

By this time Richard Martin had not been landlord of the Castle Inn for well over a year and had recently resigned as postmaster. The Post Office proposed to allow him the extra £10 for the period after he left the inn, but thought £5 sufficient for the time he was innkeeper. Martin persisted with his claim and eventually received the full amount. Was he now thoroughly disillusioned or eager to move on to other things? We do not know; after 1794 Richard Martin disappears from the Windsor records; William Whyatt had already succeeded him as postmaster, and royal warrant holder and landlord of the Castle Inn. Richard Martin was a complex character who played an important role in the history of the town at this period when both town and postal services were expanding, yet in the end it is difficult decide whether he was one of the successes or failures. Perhaps it is sufficient to visualise him busy attending to his guests and customers and dealing with the exacting job of keeping the records and accounts for the post office. Much of the delivering and collecting of mail he employed others to do, yet maybe he did perform one such duty himself – delivering to Windsor Castle thrice weekly a bottle of sea water from Weymouth brought by the Staines to Windsor Rider for the wife of George III, Queen Charlotte of Mecklenburg-Strelitz.

Judith Hunter

References and Acknowledgements

  1. Royal Borough of New Windsor Sessions Book 1750-1787; Berks Record Office Wi JR/10.
  2. Royal Borough of New Windsor Chamberlains’ Accounts 1735-1806; Berks Records Office Wi FAc 3.
  3. Royal Borough of New Windsor Rental 1528; Berks Record Office Wi FRI
  4. List of Buildings of Special Architectural Interest – Borough of New Windsor Department of Environment
  5. Castle Hotel Handbill c1850; Windsor Reference Library
  6. Universal British Directory c1793; Guildhall Library, City of London
  7. Daniel Patterson A New Accurate Description of all Direct and Cross Roads in Great Britain (various editions 1771-1832) John Cary Cary’s New Itinerary …
  8. The appointment of William Want as hackneyman to His Majesty in 1792 shows that he succeeded Richard Martin: Royal Archives RA WB 1/252
  9. Application for a royal warrant, 1830 to Department of Master of Horse: Royal Archives; RA MOHI/57¢c-502h; also RA MOH/WB2/225
  10. G Homer-Woolf The Postal History of Windsor (1980)
  11. Postmaster General’s Reports and accompanying correspondence: Post Office Record Office; Post 42, Vol. 4, Item 151C; Post 40
  12. Postmaster General’s Reports and accompanying correspondence: Post Office Record Office; Post 42, Vol.7 Items 47B, 85B, 143B, and 152; Post 40

Further reading: J.HUNTER, From Tudor Inn to Trusthouse Hotel (1985)

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