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While renovating a cottage in Gloucestershire, an old tin box was found wedged inside the large chimney piece. It contained six letters to a Miss Elizabeth Peart dating from between 1823 and 1826. They make interesting reading, telling of a secret romance. This is only one side of the correspondence, but it is evident what must have been contained in the missing replies.In the first letter, it seems Phillip was a prize fighter, recuperating from an illegal bare-knuckle fist fight and unable to show his face for fear of transportation, presumably to Australia. Elizabeth has helped him get away after the fight. Phillip has fallen in love with her and tries to arrange to see her soon at the Air Balloon inn. This inn is still there at the bottom of the A417 hill running down from Birdlip towards Cheltenham. We should not be too surprised at the name: the Montgolfier Brothers had pioneered hot air balloons in France in 1783 and the air currents round Birdlip were excellent for English trials of the new sport. But the poor transport and condition of the turnpike made it difficult for the lovers to meet.
Phillip gives up fighting and, by the second letter, is employed as a toll-gate keeper at Purton; possibly at the Collins Lane Gate which is the best preserved today. He has problems getting letters to Elizabeth, since the postal service didn't start until 1840. One hoped someone was going that way and would leave letters near their destination. But Phillip cannot get time away from his post - pressure of work is obviously not solely a New Millennium problem! He tries to pacify her with a collection of presents.
While Phillip is "going straight", the tone of the letters suggests Elizabeth might be a girl at a baudy house offering comforts to travellers on the Cheltenham to Tewkesbury turn-pike road! If this is all true, it is no wonder that the letters are to be kept secret. Almost childishly so! At the bottom of the first letter, Phillip has written his name in invisible ink - that's only lemon juice! - so that their secret will remain.
Some three years after the first letter, Phillip dies from "violent influxiations of the chest". Whether influenza, bronchitis or tuberculosis doesn't really matter much - they were all potentially fatal, and proved to be so for Phillip. On his death bed, he is still concerned about his lover and their baby son. His sister passes on a bequest of £2 ... an enormous sum of money in those days.
It is a touching story of two lovers divided by only some 30 miles but which must have seemed to them as far as crossing the Atlantic for us today!
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