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[zionius]

Originally Posted by zionius

RC507: "March 5: 11.30 leaves Dolbaran". C138: "March 5 11.20 leaves Dolbaran"
RC508: ", 176 miles from Edoras". C66 says this sentence is rejected.

After a study of the materials, now I think Reader's Companion is correct in these two readings.

In S3 March 6 entry, Gandalf rides "139 miles between 11.30 p.m on 5 Mar. and [7>] 7.30 a.m", the time and distance would exactly match MSS 4/2/17/14a, if one accepts the "11.30" reading:

5 Mar 11.20[?30] leaves Dolbaran
6 Mar 7.30 sights Edoras having ridden (with brief rest) at 16 mph. 136 miles. Rides on to Edoras (139 mi)

And the correct reading of S3 March 8 entry should be "Errand-riders of Gondor pass, [at] 176 miles from Edoras." (Tolkien emended the period after "pass" to comma when he deleted "Gandalf halts".) This is actually directly from MSS 4/2/17/14a:

8 Mar mid > 2 am 32 160
4 > 6 am 32 192

Episode of moon must be therefore in early hours of 8[March] (5 a.m.) and the errand-riders would then be about 176 miles out from Gondor which they should reach [i.e. reach Dunharrow] by dark next day.

Tolkien (or H&S) made a mistake in "176 miles out from Gondor", which should be "176 miles to Edoras" or something similar (your article doesn't contain this sentence from 4/2/17, and the original image is not released, so I am unsure of the exact intended reading). At 4 am Gandalf was 160 miles from Edoras, and 6 am he was at 192 miles, so at 5 am he was 176 miles from Edoras, and 118 miles from Minas Tirith. This is the intended time and place where they met the errand-riders. (If one accepts the meeting place to be "176 miles out from Gondor", then the meeting time would be 9pm in the previous night, which happens to be the time Pippin sees moon in the previous chronology.)