Stoney Relationships

We know that the main source of trade for James Smart was coal. It’s the stuff on which his empire was founded and he seems to have continued trading this commodity throughout his business years. But as I’ve mentioned before, he wasn’t averse to trading in anything where there was a pound or two to be made. So the next cargo I thought we could have a look at is stone.

From the documents I have seen so far there seems to have been one main geographical source for stone and that was Chepstow. There were two stone merchants that Smart was dealing with. We’ve seen before how Smart’s trows would sail frequently across the Bristol Channel stopping at various ports before returning to the Junction at Saul or going on to Gloucester or elsewhere. This made the merchants very familiar with the captains and their vessels. The various missives indicate that they were quite used to issuing orders and instructions without any prior consultation with Smart. This is probably because not only was Smart ordering stone but his boats were being used to fulfil other orders for the merchants as well.

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William Jones, Stone Merchant & Contractor, Tutshill, Chepstow was one such. The documents we have relate to one year only, being 1894. Or so I thought until I had a light bulb moment and checked the handwriting against other documents that I’d recorded some time back. Sure enough it turns out that William Jones had a previous address being Tidenham, Chepstow and those records begin in 1891. An additional cause for the confusion was that all the documents pre 1894 were in the form of letters but in 1894 they became memoranda.

The relationship between Smart and Jones seems to have been a little uneasy. I imagine this in part was from the fact that trade was in both directions. Smart would buy stone from Jones and in turn, Jones would buy services from Smart.

Although the two men must have been trading for some time the first letter we see is in November 1891 and is pretty typical. There is a disagreement about the quality of goods supplied by Jones who writes in a rather sarcastic manner “perhaps they were too dirty or not small enough.” He goes on to comment that he can’t understand how the trow ended up “side to” on the Stank (probably a section of the river near Hardwick).

Skip on to the only communication we have for 1892. It’s December and it seems Jones and Smart are once again at loggerheads.

Jones complains that he was expecting the Flora to put in for a load of stone but she sailed past and put in at the competition. He is not at all pleased as he then had to call and load a different vessel.  He writes “If this is being done with your permission I may say I am sorry you did not let me know she was not to load Lifts. If it is done without your knowledge or permission it is a pity such a man should sail a vessel.”

1893 opens in similar fashion. It’s February and Jones is once again requesting settlement of the account for 1892 as he doesn’t want to mix up the years. Jones also tells us about the Flora arriving from Bristol and that he has loaded her with “Lifts”. He goes on to list costs for the shipping of tonnage (presumably between Chepstow and Bristol). One of the costs he lists is Coastwise Dues. Like many other terms in the documents I’m archiving, being a landlubber I had not heard of this before and so of course, I had to go and look it up. It turns out that Coastwise Dues are a tax on goods transported between ports around the UK.

Then there’s a little flurry of correspondence in the first half of 1893 beginning with a dispute over the price Jones is prepared to pay for coal mainly because Jones buys from Newport and Smart is shipping by rail from Sharpness. But only a few days later Jones ungently request a delivery via Grand Union Railway at his expense. Just to keep up the game, at the same time he remarks that Richardson (a competitor) is quoting a questionable price for Gloucester saying; “He does not know the price to Elmore Beck for freight. When he has to send a vessel there he will find out that he has to pay.” As a goodwill gesture he rounds off asking for barges to be sent as he is blocked up.

For the rest of the year things seem reasonably cordial as the two men are regularly doing business over gravel and stone delivered mostly to Stroud & Bristol using the trows Flora and Excelsior.

And so we move into 1894.

On May 10th Jones writes “Excelsior left this morning.” He goes on to say that the captain is in need of money and “please send a donkey to the Junction on order.” The Junction of course refers to Saul but there is no indication of why a donkey might be needed.

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The following day (May 11th) another missive is despatched by Jones. This time it seems he has received two urgent orders for stone to be delivered to Stroud and he writes “I have ordered the Excelsior and the Flora to discharge for them, kindly let them do so as it will not do for me to disappoint them.”

In an undated communication Jones says that Henry (captain of the Flora) has said that some broken stone will be needed for Chalford and goes on to say that he can have it ready by the time the Flora returns.

Our last recorded communiqué is typical of the two men. In July of that year there was a dispute over a delay in Jones settling his account. He in turn blames Smart for not sending vessels in time. This must also relate to stone bound for Stroud as Jones requests that Watkins comes down on the Perseverance to take a cargo of stone “so that they have some to go on breaking.”

Over the same period Smart was dealing with another Chepstow stone merchant; William Davis. From the letters it would seem that this relationship was somewhat less acrimonious. Either that or Davis scrupulously avoided anything that would damage his business.

Davis promotes himself as supplying the best stone at better prices than any other Chepstow merchant (I wonder who he meant ?) but he’s not averse to pointing out that Captain Watkins is trying to charge too much per ton.

One of the places Davis is shipping stone to on the Flora is “The Flat on the Severn”. I can only think this must refer to Flat Holm in the Bristol Channel which at the time had a sanatorium located on it. Perhaps there was a requirement for building material.  

Like Jones, Davis was familiar with the captains and the trows in the service of Smart. They are often referred to by name in the correspondence and it seems that Davis and Smart were in the habit of meeting in person.

In the last letter from Davis that we have he thanks Smart for the promise of trows and offers him best broken stone and clean gravel at 2/- per ton and in addition tells us that the cost of a voyage to “The Flat” (wherever it may be) is 30/- (shillings).

There are three other suppliers of stone mentioned in the documents that I have seen so far; G.V. Frazer, Siddington Stone Quarries, Cirencester - The Clee Hill Granite Company, Ludlow, Shropshire – W. Halling, Stone & Coal Merchant, Twyning, Nr. Tewkesbury.

From the former there are just two letters, one in 1891 in which, seemingly true to form there is a dispute over money and another in 1893 where Frazer quotes the cost of Block Stone and River Valley Stone and asks for an order to secure.

Similarly there are only two memoranda from Thomas Roberts of Clee Hill Granite dated on consecutive days in April. In the first Roberts confirms he is in receipt of a cancellation of an order for stone but on the following day he advises that the stone was already on a truck and had left their siding and therefore they could not stop it. I think I can see another Smart dispute on the horizon and I’m hoping that more documentation might come to light that allows us to see the conclusion.

There is only one document from Halling. He requests a trow to ship 60 tons of Broak Stone along with 300 yards of Curb Stone from his quarry to Mr. R. Savage of Stonehouse.

Transporting stone seems to have been a bit of a rocky road for James Smart.