Before the advent of the motor car and steam train, and even hot air balloons (or "envelopes" as they were properly called), horses were an essential form of transport. Not everyone had a canal or river nearby to take a journey by boat. People got about on horseback, or by cart or carriage.

Town coaches were massive, drawn by up to six horses, and generally afforded only by the rich. It took a cartload of cash to be able to pay for their upkeep, a mews to house them in and a stable team to look after them, as well as the coachman and grooms. The general public had to travel by public coach, hackney carriages in the city and stage or the mail coaches for long-distance.

A gentleman's horses were often a status symbol. A matched pair or matched team drew admiring glances and clean and healthy horses added to the kudos. Tattersalls of London was a leading horse market (cattle) in the 18th and 19th centuries.

When buying horses for riding or for transportation, a coachman looked for strength and fitness on a city's cobblestone streets, a steady temperament and smooth gait, and if for a team, that the horses worked well together.

Horses (and ponies and donkeys to a lesser degree) were essential to the commerce and social life of society.

Transport was essential to the plot of Winning Lady Madeleine, one of my Georgian Romances.