Dimensions 200 x 320 mm. Single leaf broadside. Early horizontal folds, a trifle creased, manuscript accounting notes (unrelated to the document) to verso.

An apparently unrecorded Regency broadside announcing the letting by auction of several tollgates on highways in Sherborne, Dorset. The collection of tolls, nominally raised in order to defray road maintenance expenses, was overseen by numerous 'turnpike trusts', each established by an individual act of parliament. The first turnpike road reached Dorset in 1753. Universally despised, and frequently corrupt, the turnpike system was eventually rendered obsolete by the rise of the railways. In 1895 the system was discontinued, when responsibility for the roads was handed to local authorities.