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 service between Peckham and Oxford Circus still operates and is still the number 12. It may be the oldest operating bus route in London. In 1915, the first woman bus conductor in London worked on Tilling route number 37. During World War I, women were recruited to replace men who had joined the Armed Forces. In 1911, Tilling introduced the Tilling-Stevens TTA1 petrol-electric bus into its fleet; despite some drawbacks of the technology, this type formed the mainstay of the fleet for some years. In 1914, just before the outbreak of World War I, the last horse-bus operated on the