William Attersall was a Winchester carriagemaker and civic leader

For half a cen­tu­ry, William Attersall oper­at­ed a car­riage shop in Winchester.  His busi­ness built and sold new car­riages at his fac­to­ry.  He also repaired, paint­ed, and trimmed out car­riages for their owners.

It’s dif­fi­cult to imag­ine trav­el in the days before auto­mo­biles and good roads.  Before the 20^th cen­tu­ry, a farmer had three ways of com­ing to town.  He could walk, ride a horse, or ride in a horse and bug­gy.  Today, we have only to hop in the car and turn the key.  In ear­li­er times, one had to go out and catch the horse, sad­dle it up, or hitch it to the car­riage.  And, of course, one had to feed and care for the horse between rides.  That may sound real­ly incon­ve­nient to us, but the Amish do it as a mat­ter of course—every day.

I’ve long been fas­ci­nat­ed by all the dif­fer­ent types of car­riages.  The most com­mon horse-drawn vehi­cle was called a bug­gy.  These were sim­ple to con­struct, light­weight, and rel­a­tive­ly inex­pen­sive.  The Bluegrass Heritage Museum has an antique bug­gy on the sec­ond floor (donat­ed by Ray Watson of Winchester).

For a step up, one could pur­chase a sur­rey.  With its high­er seats and more com­fort­able ride, it was America’s first plea­sure vehi­cle.  On Sunday after­noon, cou­ples often took their sur­rey out for a dri­ve through the coun­try­side.  They were remem­bered in Rogers and Hammerstein’s famous song from the musi­cal Oklahoma!:  “Surrey With The Fringe on Top.”

The phaeton was a high-end car­riage known for its ele­gant design.  It had four large wheels and were often drawn by a matched pair of hors­es.  Phaetons were a pop­u­lar sta­tus sym­bol among the upper classes.

Attersall’s car­riage fac­to­ry pro­duced all these mod­els and oth­ers, as well as a vari­ety of farm wag­ons.  He had plen­ty of com­pe­ti­tion.  The 1850 Clark County cen­sus lists a dozen car­riage-wag­on mak­ers in Winchester, and the impor­tance of the indus­try per­sist­ed for anoth­er six­ty years.  The 1908 City Directory lists three deal­ers of bug­gies and car­riages and five liv­ery sta­bles.  No one was sell­ing cars yet.  The first auto­mo­bile deal­er appeared the fol­low­ing year.  Carriagemaking dimin­ished as the auto indus­try grew.

William Allen Attersall (1841−1908) was born in Whitechapel, London, immi­grat­ed to America with his fam­i­ly as a youth, and locat­ed in Winchester in 1852.  He was list­ed in the 1860 Clark County cen­sus as a car­riage­mak­er liv­ing with his par­ents.  His father, Thomas C. Attersall, was list­ed as a car­riage­smith, per­haps denot­ing a more skilled craftsman.

Following the out­break of the Civil War, William enlist­ed as a cor­po­ral in the 20^th Kentucky Volunteer Infantry (Union).  He was pro­mot­ed to lieu­tenant and served under Lt. Col. Charles Hanson of Winchester.  His unit par­tic­i­pat­ed in bat­tles at Shiloh and Corinth, Tennessee, Lebanon, Kentucky, and the Atlanta Campaign.  After mus­ter­ing out in 1865, William mar­ried Charlotte Bono and returned to his car­riage business.

In 1872 he began adver­tis­ing his car­riage fac­to­ry in the Clark County Democrat.  His shop was next door to the fire department’s engine house (lat­er home of the Engine House Deli) locat­ed on West Lexington Avenue.  This three-sto­ry frame build­ing with a base­ment had been home to James McClymonds’ car­riage shop until he retired. 

In addi­tion to man­u­fac­tur­ing car­riages, Attersall was the local agent for the nation­al­ly-known Columbus Buggy Company.  He lat­er also became a deal­er for the Kauffman Buggy Company of Ohio and McFarland Carriage Company of Indiana.  Buyers of upscale car­riages could pick out mod­els from their cat­a­logs and have them shipped to Winchester.

In 1902, claim­ing he had earned a rest, Attersall sold his fac­to­ry, includ­ing all his tools, har­ness and stock, to an up-and-com­ing young busi­ness­man, Matt Bean.  Attersall, how­ev­er, bare­ly slowed up.  He had long served as fire chief for Winchester’s vol­un­teer fire depart­ment, which was housed in the build­ing next door to his man­u­fac­to­ry. He made con­tin­u­ous addi­tions to the department’s facil­i­ties, equip­ment, and water lines, and recruit­ed sev­en­ty “young lad­dies” for his vol­un­teer crew.

In 1905, Attersall built a fine new home at the north­west cor­ner of Alabama and Calloway streets, and the fol­low­ing year, he took office as Winchester’s fifth may­or.  He was forced to resign his office in April 1908 due to ill health.  When he passed away that December, Winchester lost one of its most ded­i­cat­ed pub­lic ser­vants.  Attersall had served on the school board, the city coun­cil, and numer­ous civic improve­ment boards.

Downtown busi­ness­es closed for his funer­al, which the news­pa­per declared was the largest ever held in the city.  All mem­bers of the fire depart­ment, police depart­ment, city coun­cil, and  Hickman Lodge of the Odd Fellows marched in a line to the Winchester Cemetery.