A MACHINE FOR DISENGAGING HORSES FROM COACHES, CHAISES, AND SUCH LIKE CARRIAGES, ON ANY EMERGENCY, BY WHICH PERSONS RIDING IN ANY OF THOSE CARRIAGES MIGHT IN AN INSTANT, WITH THE UTMOST EASE, SET THE HORSES LOOSE FROM THE CARRIAGE, WHEN GOING AT ANY PACE OR ON ANY GROUND WHATEVER, WHEREBY VARIOUS MISFORTUNES THAT MIGHT OTHERWISE HAPPEN TO HIS MAJESTY'S SUBJECTS BY HORSES RUNNING AWAY WITH CARRIAGES MIGHT BE EFFECTUALLY PREVENTED
Year: 1766

page_text: TO ALL TO WHOM THESE PRESENTS SHALL COME, I, THOMAS
HILLCOAT, of the Town and County of Newcastle-upon-Tyne, Ironmonger,
send greeting.
WHEREAS I, the said Thomas Hillcoat, did, by my Petition, humbly
represent unto the King's most Excellent Majesty, that I had invented "A
MACHINE FOR DISENGAGING HORSES FROM COACHES, CHAISES, AND SUCH LIKE
CARRIAGES, ON ANY EMERGENCY, BY WHICH PERSONS RIDING IN ANY OF THOSE
CARRIAGES MIGHT IN AN INSTANT, WITH THE UTMOST EASE, SET THE HORSES LOOSE
FROM THE CARRIAGE, WHEN GOING AT ANY PACE OR ON ANY GROUND WHATEVER,
WHEREBY VARIOUS MISFORTUNES THAT MIGHT OTHERWISE HAPPEN TO HIS MAJESTY'S
SUBJECTS BY HORSES RUNNING AWAY WITH CARRIAGES MIGHT BE EFFECTUALLY
PREVENTED; and whereas His said Majesty was most graciously pleased to
condescend to the prayer of my said Petition, and by His Royal Letters
Patent under the Great Seal of Great Britain, bearing date at Westminster,
the Twenty-eighth day of January, in the sixth year of His reign, did give
and grant unto me, the said Thomas Hillcoat, my executors, administrators,
and assigns, His special licence and sole authority, that I, the said Thomas
Hillcoat, my executors, administrators, and assigns, from time to time and at
at all times thereafter during the term of fourteen years from the date of the
said Letters Patent, according to the form of the Statute in such case made
and provided, should and might make, use, exercise, and vend my said
Invention, within that part of His Majesty's Kingdom of Great Britain
called England, Ilis Dominion of Wales, and Town of Berwick-upon-Tweed,
in such manner as to me, my executors, administrators, or assigns, or any
of them, should in our discretion seen meet; in which said Letters Patent
there is a proviso contain'd that if I, the said Thomas Hillcoat, should not
particularly describe and ascertain the nature of my said Invention, and in

page_text: what manner the same is to be performed, by an instrument in writing
under my hand and seal, and cause the same to be inrolled in His Majesty's
High Court of Chancery within four kalendar months next after the date of
the said Letters Patent, that then the said Letters Patent should be void.
NOW KNOW YE, that in compliance with the said proviso, I, the said
Thomas Hillcoat, do hereby describe my said Invention for disengaging
horses from coaches, chaises, and such like carriages as aforesaid, in manner
following (that is to say) :-
First, I have given a Plan thereof in the margin above, to which the
following description referrs; (to wit,) A, the splenter barr of the carriage.
B, B, B, B, four pins to which the traces are fastned, secured in the splenter
barr, as next described. C, one of the irons to which the pins that hold the
traces are fix'd; the iron passes through the splenter barr A, and is held fast
therein by four bolts D, D, D, D, fix'd in the barr E, which pass through the
trace pin irons, and secures them in the splenter barr. F, a small round axis,
with a leaver G at each end to lift the barr E, and a longer leaver H in the
middle, with a leather strap I fix'd at the end thereof, to come into the body of
the carriage, by the pulling of which strap the bar E is lifted up with the bolts
D, D, D, D, that hold the trace pins B, B, B, B, and by that means the trace
pins are unfix'd, and the horses immediately disengaged from the splenter bar
A. K, K, two standards fix'd to the splenter barr to support the axis F.
L, L, two springs to keep down the bar E. M, the pole of the carriage.
N, a hollow bar of iron fix'd to the end of the pole M. O, a round ball
of wood with two springs fixed to it, which are put into the hollow barr N, and
are pulled out by રી sliding socket P, with two buckles thereon, to which the
breast leathers are fastned by straps, so that when the horses are let loose
from the splenter bar A, the socket P slides along the hollow bar N against
the round ball of wood O, with the two springs, and forcing out the same, the
socket slides off the hollow barr and entirely disengages the horses from the
carriage.
In witness whereof, I, the said Thomas Hillcoat, have hereunto set my
hand and seal, this Second day of May, in the sixth year of the reign
of our Sovereign Lord George the Third, now King of Great Britain,
and so forth, and in the year of our Lord One thousand seven hundred
THOS HILLCOAT. (L.S.)
Signed and sealed, in the presence of,
W* GIBSON,
A Master Extraordinary in the High of Chancery.

page_text: AND BE IT REMEMBRED, that on the said Second day of May, in
the sixth year of the reign of His Majesty King George the Third, the
aforesaid Thomas Hillcoat came before our said Lord the King in His
Chancery, and acknowledged the Writing aforesaid, and every thing therein
contained, by his signing and sealing the same in the presence of the aforesaid
William Gibson, a Master Extraordinary in His said Majesty's High
Court of Chancery. And the said Writing was stamped according to the
Statute made in the sixth year of the reign of King William and Queen
Mary, and so forth.
Inrolled the Eighth day of May, in the aforesaid sixth year of the reign
of His Majesty King George the Third, 1766.