The building might have had
an open space beneath that would have been useful in bad weather on market
days. The disappearance of the shambles occurred about the same time as
the sweeping away of the stocks that stood on the north side of them, for
these were the years of a great municipal awakening in Pickering, an
awakening that unfortunately could not distinguish between an insanitary
sewer and the obsolete but historic and quite inoffensive stocks; both had
to disappear before the indiscriminating wave of progress.
[Illustration: The Shambles at Pickering. A sketch plan and elevation
drawn from details given by old inhabitants.]
In October 1846 the railway between Whitby and Pickering, that had been
built ten years before for a horse-drawn coach, was opened for steam
traction, and although this event is beyond the memories of most of the
present-day Pickeronians, there is still living in the town a man named
Will Wardell who is now seventy-seven, and as a boy of twelve acted as
postillion to the horse railway. Postillions were only employed for a
short time, the horse or horses being soon afterwards driven from the
coach.
As a rule they employed one horse from Pickering to Raindale, where there
was a public-house; then two to Fenbogs, and one to Bank Top above
Goathland. If the wind were fair the coach would run to Grosmont by
itself, after that one horse took the coach to Whitby. If more than one
horse were used they were yoked tandem; five were kept at Raindale, where
Wardell lived.
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