Walter Bagehot of Langport

Walter Bagehot was born in Langport on 3rd February 1826.  He became an economist and political analyst and he was one of the most influential journalists in the mid-Victorian period. His parents were Thomas Watson Bagehot and Edith Stuckey.  Several generations of Walter's father's family had been general merchants and his mother's uncle, Vincent Stuckey, was in charge of the largest bank in the West of England.

He attended Langport Grammar School and at the age of 13 he was sent to Bristol College.  There he learnt about mathematics, philosophy, literature, natural sciences and the classics. He then attended University College London.  While there he made several long-term friends, including the poet Arthur Hugh Clough, Richard Holt Hutton (who later became the editor of The Spectator), lawyer and diarist Henry Crabb Robinson and the poet Samuel Taylor Coleridge.  He graduated with first class honours in 1846 and was awarded a masters degree in 1848, along with the university's gold medal in moral and intellectual philosophy.

Walter then studied law for 3 years but didn't like it.  He was in Paris in 1851 at the time of Louis Napoleon's coup d'etat and wrote a supportive article about it.  This convinced him that he could write and he produced many literary essays, studies of leading political figures and articles about economics while working for Stuckey's Bank.  These were noticed by James Wilson, who was an MP, financial secretary to the treasury in Lord Palmerston and founder of The Economist magazine.  He got to know James Wilson's eldest daughter Eliza and he married her in April 1858.  After their marriage they lived near Clevedon and later in London.  They had no children.

By 1860 Walter was manager of the Bristol branch of Stuckey's Bank.  During this year James Wilson died in India and Walter gained control of The Economist. For the next 17 years he wrote the main article every week for the magazine and transformed it into one of the world's most important financial and political publications.

Walter Bagehot described himself as a conservative liberal.  He believed that rapid urbanisation and industrialisation were creating social problems in Britain.  He also took a great interest in international affairs.  In 1867 he published a book entitled The English Constitution.  In it he examined how the British government really operated and in whose hands true power was held.  He was one of the first people to observe the power of the Cabinet.  He was friends with both the Liberal William Ewart Gladstone and the Conservative Lord Carnarvon.  He tried unsuccessfully to get elected as an MP for Manchester, Bridgwater and London University (he was a poor public speaker).

In 1873 Walter Bagehot published Lombard Street. This publication argued for a larger central reserve to be controlled by the Bank of England.  However, it also contained the beginnings of the modern theory of central banking and exchange control.

Walter Bagehot's health began to worsen in the 1870s.  He suffered from recurrent respiratory infections and migraines and his vision and heart began to fail.  On 24th March 1877 he died of a lung infection while visiting his father at Herd's Hill near Curry Rivel.  He was buried in the family grave at All Saints' Church in Langport.

Bank House, Cheapside where Walter Bagehot was born

Plaque commemorating Walter Bagehot above the front door of Bank House

Walter Bagehot Memorial Window, All Saints' Church, Langport

Walter Bagehot's grave in the churchyard of All Saints' Church, Langport

Walter Bagehot's gravestone

Bow Wharf Warehouse, Langport

This was built by the Parrett Navigation Company, which was owned by Vincent Stuckey and Walter Bagehot

The Nailsea Coalfield

Nailsea hides its coal mining heritage well.  Most visitors to the town are unlikely to notice the few remaining engine and winding houses or spoil heaps.

The Nailsea Coalfield is an outlying section of the much larger Somerset and Bristol Coalfield. Coal seams in the Nailsea area, which are sandwiched between layers of pennant sandstone, are located in an arc around the north and east of the town.  The arc starts in the North Street/Union Street area of the town.  It then runs parallel to Silver Street and High Street and continues on through Nailsea Park, Trendlewood and down to Backwell Common and the railway station.  The coal measures are deepest in the centre of the arc.  The deepest mine was Golden Valley at around 620 feet deep.

Coal mining in Nailsea started in the early 16th century when it is recorded that coal was transported from Nailsea to Yatton to be burnt in a limekiln. At first the coal was only mined where it outcropped near the surface but by the mid-18th century deep pit mining had commenced.  There were 10 workable coal seams.  Some of them were up to 3 feet 6 inches thick but others were only 18 inches thick and it was barely viable to mine these thinner seams.  

Some of the Nailsea coal mines were privately owned but many of them were run by, or associated with, one company – White & Co.  This company started in 1786 as a 3 man partnership between Isaac White, Peter Cox and Joseph Whitchurch.  In 1788 Bristol glassmaker John Robert Lucas bought a share in the partnership and set up a glassworks in Nailsea, which provided a market for the coal. 

Power for winding in the mines was initially provided by horses.  Steam pumping engines were introduced in the mid-18th century.  This enabled the mining of coal measures, which couldn’t previously be exploited due to flooding.  Horses continued to be used for winding purposes until well into the 19th century.  Ponies (and young boys) were also employed below ground to haul sleds and waggons containing coal.

Tramways were built to link up some of the collieries (Youngwood/Whiteoak and Grace’s/West End) with the main railway line, which reached Nailsea in the 1840s.

Most of the coal produced was sold locally to heat houses and churches in the town and surrounding villages, to fire local lime kilns, to power the Nailsea Glassworks and in the pits themselves to fire the steam engines.

Output from the Nailsea Coalfield reached its peak in the 1850s.  In the 1841 Census there were 149 people in Nailsea and Backwell who were directly connected with coal production.  This number rose to 193 in 1851, then fell to 170 in 1861 and 70 in 1871.  It rose to 103 in 1881 but by 1891 only 16 people were employed producing coal.   Coal mines in the Nailsea area started to decline in the 1860s due to competition from larger mines in South Wales and the North of England, where the coal was cheaper and easier to extract.  Nailsea Glassworks closed in 1873 and the last Nailsea coal mine (Whiteoak) closed in 1882.

Several examples of winding and pumping houses remain, three as ruins and two as conversions into dwellings. The most obvious remains are the small winding tower in Millennium Park, which was once part of the Old Glasshouse Pit. The Middle Engine/Elms Pit complex in the Cherington Road/Oaksey Grove area of Golden Valley is now a scheduled monument. The engine house from Farler’s Pit survives in the garden of a private house on the corner of Queens Road and Station Road.  In North Lane an engine house has been converted into a cottage and Tall Cottage in Union Street was possibly formerly an engine house.

The remains of horse whims survive at Old Glasshouse Pit and Middle Engine Pit.  Spoil heaps remain from Golden Valley, Buckland’s Batch/Goddins, East End, Backwell Common and Youngs Pits.

Former Engine House on North Street, now converted to a private house

Spoil heap on Backwell Common

Remains of Old Glasshouse Pit's horse whim in Millennium Park

The ruined winding tower of Old Glasshouse Pit in Millennium Park

Spoil heap from Youngs Pit in Nailsea Park