Riseholme (fictional village) Poppy, Duchess of Sheffield, at nearby Sheffield Castle (which Benson located at "Sheffield Bottom"—unconnected to the Yorkshire Sheffield). It was revealed in "Mapp and Lucia" that Lucia's great rival in Tilling, Elizabeth Mapp ("Miss Mapp", 1922) had once visited Riseholme and stayed at the Ambermere Arms. She also hijacked Lucia's "au reservoir" (for "au revoir") and presented it to Tilling society as her own. Cynthia and Tony Revell (1984) "Mr Benson remembered in Rye, and the world of Tilling" cited Sir Steven Runciman (1903–2000), a Cambridge historian who knew Benson well, and Benson's manservant Charlie Tomalin (d.1981) for the assertion
Thomas Tilling Company (BAT), had interests in nineteen bus companies, with Tilling being a co-owner of eleven of them, and at the same time was partly owned by Tilling itself. To simplify the arrangement, BAT was reconstructed with a new title, Tilling & British Automobile Traction Ltd (TBAT), and Tilling exchanged its shares in the various operating companies for an increased shareholding in the new company. The railways of Britain had grown significantly and many companies had developed bus services. In 1923, most of these "pre-grouping" companies merged to form four mainline companies: Great Western Railway; Southern Railway; London, Midland and Scottish