Coal Post #153 Traditional Geocache
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Difficulty:
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Terrain:
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Size:  (small)
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Coal Post
#153
This cache recognises one of approximately 200 surviving Coal Tax
Posts. These posts are to be found in a ring around London at about
fifteen miles from the City of London. They were erected under the
London Coal and Wine Duties Continuance Act, 1861. Coal sold in the
City of London had been taxed since mediaeval times and, as it was
all brought in by sea to one or two riverside wharfs, the
collection of the duty had been relatively easy. A similar duty was
collected on all wine landed in London. By the nineteenth century,
however, there was increasing trade by canal and rail, and various
acts of parliament extended the catchment area to a radius of about
twenty miles from London. The City is a small (one square mile) but
influential part of London and in 1851 an Act was passed specifying
the points, far beyond its boundaries, where the collections could
be made. Marker posts, inscribed with this legal authority, were
erected. Following enlargement of the Metropolitan Police District
in 1861 a further Act was passed and new marker posts were set to
show the boundary inside which the duty was payable. Most of these
later posts survive.
The erection of these posts was very much a last ditch attempt to
retain the tax in the face of growing opposition. The tax had been
running for at least two hundred years but within twenty years of
the posts going up it was abolished. The Industrial Revolution was
in full swing, London was expanding rapidly. The outer suburbs were
becoming towns and their residents beginning to resent paying a tax
which had very little direct benefit for them. One extreme case is
Caterham which lay (and still lies) outside the Metropolitan Police
District (MPD) but if coals were to be brought there by rail they
had to pass through the MPD and presumably were subject to the
tax.The powers to extract these taxes were abolished in 1889.
Most posts were made of cast iron and stood at four or five feet
tall, but the railway posts were large and impressive obelisks of
granite fourteen feet in height. All bore the City coat of arms.
Most of those surviving are painted white, with the arms picked out
in red, but the stone ones are often of a sombre black, still
bearing the stains accumulated on the smoky trackside. There are
five different forms of Coal Tax boundary markers in all. Most of
the posts are Grade II listed buildings.
The cache is a micro cache located close to the Coal Tax Post
number 153 in Mogador. As the cache is adjacent to a road, extra
stealth is required, please relocate the cache carefully and
discretely. You may want to visit the nearby Sportsman Pub whilst
in the area.
The cache has a log book and a pencil
If any body would like to expand to this series please
do.
Additional Hints
(Decrypt)
Onfr bs lrj