Horsedrawn cabs were a facet of life in Port-of-Spain from around 1850 and well into the 1930s, when they began to be replaced by motor cars. The trade evolved from a need for public transportation within the city. It coincided with the influx of thousands of ex-slaves who settled on the outskirts. Many of these people had been grooms, carters and blacksmiths on the sugar estates of the colony and thus were well-versed in all the horse skills. Thus the cabby was born.
Initially, the service was the realm of private owner/operators who took great pride in the appearance of themselves and their traps. Top hats and frock coats were standard attire for drivers, whose harness and reins jingled with hundreds of small steel rings.
The 1880s saw a series of fixed rates and penalties which were administered by the Trinidad Constabulary. Cab stands on Marine (Independence) Square and Brunswick (Woodford) Square were established where passengers could seek conveyance. The stands had enamelled signboards listing the distances and fares laid down in the regulations.
The period 1880-1920 was also the heyday of coachworks and livery stables. J Haynes Clark, one of the largest establishments, offered carriages for hire and, later, motorcars. Other liveries were on Abercromby Street and Frederick Street, which had blacksmith services too, since many cabbies needed to have horses shod in a hurry.
Carriages were manufactured locally by the Gittens Carriage Company in Woodbrook, as well as at Leonard Court's coachworks on South Quay. The famous Bonanza on Frederick Street had a livery on Henry Street. James Todd and Sons operated a lucrative smithy and livery on Abercromby Street, also dealing in every type of accessory, including coach paints, springs, harness, cast-iron carbide and kerosene lamps, horseshoes, and tools.
Several funny tales surround the cabmen. Like the maxi-taxis of today, they were colourful and intriguing. One set in 1920 was told by the late Arthur De Lima and involved his relative, a huge, man named Don Carlos Behrens. Don Carlos flagged down a cab driven by an equally large chap called Fatty, for obvious reasons. He could not squeeze through the tiny door in the cab and had to be helped in by Fatty, which entertained idlers stopping to see these two men-mountains wrestling as it were with each other.
After squeezing in Don Carlos , Fatty ascended to the driver's box, but the rig did not get ten feet before the whole thing tipped over from the immense top-heavy burden and destroyed the cab. (Neither Fatty nor the angry Don Carlos was hurt.) The cabs saw their end in the emergence of the motor-bus in 1913 and later, the taxi car which began to become popular in the 1920s.
The horse-cab had an odd resurgence during WWII since gasoline was rationed. The horse-cab thus became an alternative means of transport in the city, but when the war ended, along with the rationing of fuel and tyres, they disappeared for good.
