Foot warmer, c.1700-1850
This pottery foot warmer is an old-fashioned hot water bottle. It would have been used to warm the feet of someone travelling in a horse drawn coach. Hot water was poured into the top and the bottle sealed up. Other foot warmers used hot coals, or were heated in a stove before use.
Travelling in a horse drawn coach was cold, draughty and uncomfortable. Warm clothing, rugs and a foot warmer were essential, especially at night or in the winter.
Horse drawn coaches were the best way to get around Britain before railways were built in the mid-1800s. A national coach network linked towns and cities. Hull had a direct coach service to York. From York there were coaches travelling towards Newcastle, Sunderland, Whitby, Scarborough and London.
A shorter way of getting from Hull to London was to take the ferry across the River Humber to Barton. Coaches for London were timetabled to meet passengers arriving from Hull by ferry.
Coaches may have been the most efficient means of transport before railways, but they certainly werenât the most comfortable! Vibrations from the road made coach travel a painful experience. Passengers were carried inside and outside the coach, with outside being cheaper.
Outsiders usually travelled on the coach roof. There were no seats at first, so passengers were given handles to hold on to. These werenât much use, and passengers were sometimes thrown off the coach as it lurched along the road.
Travelling by coach in the winter could be dangerous. In 1806, a very cold winter, a guard on the Bristol mail coach was frozen to death. Heavy snow could leave coaches stranded or even buried. In these conditions a foot warmer would have provided little protection against the cold.
The worst coaching winter was 1836-37. A snowstorm that continued for a week after Christmas left only two mail coach routes open. The snow was higher than the roofs of the coaches. In places there were snow drifts over seven metres high.
