Transcribed from the [1891] Eyre and Spottiswoode edition byDavid Price,
OLD COACHING DAYS
SOME INCIDENTS
IN THE LIFEOF
MOSES JAMES NOBBS,
THE LAST OFTHE MAIL COACH GUARDS.
Told by Himself.
With a Preface by the Controller ofthe London
Postal Service.
Price Sixpence.
p.5PREFACE.
By the operation of the new Orderin Council regulating Civil Service superannuations, under whichofficers who have attained the age of sixty-fivehave—nolens volens—to take their pensions,there will be, at the end of this year 1891, quite an exodus ofmany who through the survival of the strongest and fittest arestill serving Her Majesty, although they have reached thePsalmist’s allotted span of three score years and ten.
The loss of our veterans in this manner will be accompanied bymany a pang of regret, but in the case of Mr. Moses James p. 6Nobbs, the lastof the Mail Coach Guards, who is now about to be pensioned, theregret is softened by the circumstance that he recognises hisinability to work any longer, and finds the quiet and comfort ofcountry life at Uxbridge, to which place he is retiring, moresuitable than Post Office occupation at a busy London RailwayStation.
Mr. Nobbs has been in the service of the Post Officefifty-five years. He commenced life as a Mail Guard, andfor years worked on Mail coaches. When the old coach systemwas superseded by railway service Mr. Nobbs did postal duty forsome years as Mail Guard on the London and Exeter Railway, andwas afterwards appointed to superintend the receipt and despatchof Mail bags at Paddington Station. Thus he was betterknown to travellers of all degrees p. 7on the Great Western line of Railwaythan to his fellow-servants, with whom he was not brought muchinto contact, owing to the fact that his duties confined him tothe Paddington Terminus. In order, therefore, that thisPost Office rara avis might be brought intoprominence—as his early retirement was thenforeseen—I wrote of him as follows in a published report onthe Post Office work in the Christmas Season of 1889:—
“The Christmas postal traffic on the GreatWestern Railway necessitated the running of the Night Mail trainin two portions between London and Penzance, the first parttaking the passengers, and the second being reserved exclusivelyfor the Mails. Strangely enough, the despatch of the Mailsfrom Paddington Station was superintended by the only p. 8Mail CoachGuard now in the service, Mr. James Nobbs, who for over fiftyyears has most faithfully looked after Her Majesty
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