The History of the Post Office Part 2

[8] Lord Macaulay's words are:--"The revenue of this establishment was not derived solely from the charge for the transmission of letters. The Post Office alone was ent.i.tled to furnish post-horses; and, from the care with which this monopoly was guarded, we may infer that it was found profitable."

In May 1660 Clement Oxenbridge, to whose exertions the Act of 1657 would seem to have been largely due, pet.i.tioned the Council of State to reimburse him the expenses to which he had been put in improving the posts, and the Council of State, after investigating the claim, reported the particulars to the House of Commons for directions. It was not, however, until after William and Mary had ascended the throne that any further step was taken. Oxenbridge, whose necessities had become greater as his age advanced, was then by the King's direction given an appointment under the Post Office of the annual value of 100; and this salary he continued to draw, although too old to discharge the duties for which it was paid, until his death in 1696.

CHAPTER V

WILLIAM DOCKWRA

1660-1685

At the Restoration the Post Office was leased to Henry Bishopp of Henfield in Suss.e.x, for the term of seven years at a rent of 21,500 a year, or more than double the amount which had been paid by the previous farmer. Before three years had elapsed, however, Bishopp surrendered his lease, and was succeeded for the remainder of his term and at the same rent by Daniel O'Neile, Groom of the King's Bedchamber. O'Neile had loyally adhered to Charles during his exile, had attended his Sovereign on his visit to Scotland, had been banished that kingdom, and in connection with his banishment had achieved a singular distinction. He had given a written undertaking consenting to his own death if he ever returned.

Even at a rent of 21,500, as the Court had doubtless by this time learned, the Post Office was not a bad investment. O'Neile, like Bishopp, was to enjoy a monopoly of the carrying of letters, and to make what he could out of it; but he was rigidly to adhere to the rates of postage prescribed by the Act, charging neither more nor less. Old posts were not to be altered nor new posts erected, without the sanction of the Secretary of State; and the Secretary of State was to possess a veto on appointments and, as occasion might require, to "have the survey and inspection of all letters." To these conditions was afterwards added another. This was that no postmaster or other officer was to remain in the service who should not within six months obtain and forward to the postmaster-general a certificate, under the hand and seal of the Bishop of the diocese, to the effect that he was "conformable to the discipline of the Church of England."

In 1667, O'Neile's lease having expired, Lord Arlington, Secretary of State in the Cabinet known as the Cabal, was appointed postmaster-general; and, after a while, the office was again let out to farm, this time at a rent of 43,000 a year. Rapidly as the rent had grown, the public demands had grown more rapidly still, and little, if any, effort had been made to satisfy them. How inadequate the posts were, about this time, to meet the public requirements may be judged from a circ.u.mstance connected with Bishopp's appointment. The letters patent appointing him were to take effect from the 25th of June 1660, but their validity was to depend on an Act of Parliament, the Act reconst.i.tuting the General Post Office, which did not pa.s.s until some months afterwards. Meanwhile a whole crop of posts had sprung up between London and the country, which could not be suppressed until the Act was pa.s.sed. As compensation for the loss he sustained by this encroachment on his monopoly between the 25th of June and the 29th of September Bishopp claimed and received no less than 500.

There is preserved in the Guildhall Library a letter from the Duke of Buckingham, to which the following note is appended:--"The great fire of London broke out on the 2nd of September 1666. It is seen by the date of this letter that the Duke of Buckingham, at that time in the highest position at Court and in the zenith of his power, was at Worthing, and did not receive intelligence of the awful calamity until after the city had been burning for five days." We do not know by what means the Duke was informed of the calamity, nor is it material to our present purpose that we should do so. All we desire now to observe is that if, as is not improbable, he was informed of it by letter, the letter--as we proceed to shew--reached him in due course of post. The fire broke out at midnight on the 2nd of September, and the 2nd of September was a Sat.u.r.day, after which, except to the Downs and to places abroad, there was no post out of London until Tuesday the 5th, or rather, as the mails started after midnight, until early in the morning of Wednesday the 6th.

Arundel was then the post-town for Worthing, and for the first part of the distance the course of post was, as it continued to be until the day of railways, through Tooting, Ewell, Epsom or Ebbesham as it was still called, Leatherhead, and Dorking. Continuing thence, not, as in later times, through Horsham, but through the hamlet of Coldharbour, the post-road skirted the foot of Leith Hill and pa.s.sed through Stone Street, Billinghurst, and Amberley to Arundel, which would be reached late in the afternoon of Wednesday. Between Arundel and Worthing the distance is ten miles, and the postmaster would not, at the earliest, take out the letter for delivery until the morning of Thursday the 7th, or five days after the fire had broken out. Indeed, it may be permitted to us to doubt whether the letter, if letter there was, would have been delivered as early as the 7th, had it been for a less important personage.

Meagre as the means of communication were in those days, even such means as existed were not matter of common knowledge. The Post Office did not advertise its wares; and no newspapers then existed to do for the Post Office what the Post Office omitted to do for itself. What towns possessed post-houses of their own, and how these towns stood in relation to other towns which did not enjoy the same advantage, might well be considered essential information; yet even of this no public announcement was given. Blome, in his _Britannia_, printed in 1671, remarks upon this defect, and for the benefit of his readers proceeds to supply it. After commenting upon the convenience which the Post Office affords, and lamenting that this convenience is not more generally known, he gives a list of the post towns which each county possesses, and supplements it with a series of county maps, so that, as he explains, persons desirous of writing to any particular place may be able to find out for themselves where the nearest post-house stands. As late as the end of the seventeenth and beginning of the eighteenth centuries separate maps appear to have been published with the same object, as a matter of private enterprise. In these maps the post towns are indicated by a castle surmounted by the royal standard.

But it was within the metropolis itself that the public need was greatest. Between London and the country posts went at unequal intervals indeed, and at intervals in some cases unduly long, and yet with regularity. To Kent and the Downs there was a post daily; to other parts of England and to Scotland a post every other day; and to Wales and to Ireland a post twice a week. But between one part of London and another there was no post at all. A resident in London having a letter for delivery within the metropolitan area had only one choice, to take the letter himself or to send it by another. And let the bearer of a letter be who he might, there was an inconvenience to which he was constantly exposed. The houses were not numbered, and were mainly to be recognised by the signs they bore. Later on, men who delivered letters over the same ground day after day complained that it was not always easy to find the address. Without local knowledge it must have been sometimes impossible.

Happily, in England the spirit of enterprise is such that an acknowledged want affecting any considerable section of the public is seldom suffered to endure very long. And so it proved in the present instance. The man who now undertook to relieve the capital from the intolerable inconvenience under which it laboured was William Dockwra, a merchant of the city of London. Dockwra had been a sub-searcher in the Custom House, and through some little interest he possessed at Court had been allowed to dispose of his place. The idea of the penny post is said indeed to have originated with Robert Murray, an upholsterer in Paternoster Row; but, be that as it may, to Dockwra belongs the credit of giving it practical shape. A man of less resolution or less convinced of the inherent merits of his undertaking might well have been daunted by the difficulties he had to encounter. The undertaking had been conceived in so bold a spirit that to carry it out would involve an expense which Dockwra's unaided resources were altogether unable to bear. A difficulty still greater than the want of funds was the determined opposition of the Duke of York. In 1663 the profits of the Post Office had been settled on the Duke for his support and maintenance, and, with an eye ever intent on his own interests, he discerned or thought he discerned in the new project an infringement of his rights.

Undeterred by these difficulties, Dockwra persevered in the task he had taken in hand. At length the appointed day arrived. On the 1st of April 1680,[9] London, which had hitherto had no post at all, suddenly found itself in possession of one in comparison with which even the post of our own time is cast into the shade. For the purposes of the undertaking London and its suburbs were divided into seven districts with a sorting office in each. From Hackney in the north to Lambeth in the south, from Blackwall in the east to Westminster in the west, there was not a point within the bills of mortality which the new post did not reach. Between four and five hundred receiving offices were opened in a single morning.

Placards were distributed and advertis.e.m.e.nts inserted in the public intelligences announcing where these offices were. Messengers called there for letters every hour. These, if for the country, were carried to the General Post Office, and if for the town, to the respective sorting offices. From the sorting offices, after being sorted and entered in books kept for the purpose, they were sent out for delivery, to the Inns of Court or places of business ten or twelve times a day, and to other places according to distance from four to eight times. Nor was the service confined to letters. It extended also to parcels, the only condition being that neither parcel nor letter should exceed one pound in weight,[10] or ten pounds in value. Subject to these limitations the charge between one part of London and another was one penny. An exception indeed was made in the case of Hackney, Islington, Newington b.u.t.ts, and Lambeth, which were then separate towns. There one penny carried only to the receiving office, and for delivery at a private house the charge was one penny more. Delivery in the street was not allowed.

[9] Curiously enough, the Post Office Report for 1854 gives the year as 1683; but this is an error.

[10] Here also the Post Office Report for 1854 is in error. It says that at first there was no limit to the weight of a packet.

But it was not only in the matter of weight and frequency of delivery that the new undertaking was conceived in the most liberal spirit.

Provided a letter or parcel was securely tied and sealed and its contents endorsed on the outside, the charge of one penny covered not only cost of conveyance but insurance as well, up to a limit of ten pounds. That is to say, subject to this limit, if a parcel or a letter or its contents were lost, Dockwra would, the conditions being observed, make the value good.

There is yet another novelty which Dockwra introduced. As a check upon his messengers he supplied the seven sorting offices with stamps bearing their own initial letters and denoting the several hours of the day.

With one of these stamps all letters and parcels were impressed as they pa.s.sed through the post, and if in the busy parts of the capital they were not delivered within little more than an hour from the time denoted by the impression, the public were encouraged to complain. The following are specimens of the stamps which Dockwra used:--

[Ill.u.s.tration: Three stamps]

This was the introduction of postmarks. In the first and last impressions Mor. 8 signifies of course 8 o'clock in the morning, and Af.

4, 4 o'clock in the afternoon. In the second or middle impression the initial letter L signifies Lyme Street, where the princ.i.p.al office of the penny post was held at Dockwra's private dwelling-house, formerly the dwelling-house of Sir Robert Abdy.

The General Post Office, until lately in Bishopsgate Street, stood at this time in Lombard Street, where it occupied a site on part of which the branch office now stands. There the persons employed, all told, numbered 77. In the country and dependent on the chief office were 227 postmasters, viz. 182 in England and Scotland and 45 in Ireland. Twelve persons were also employed in the office in Dublin. Altogether and throughout the whole of the kingdom the General Post Office, in 1680, gave employment to 316 persons, a number very much less than that which Dockwra employed in London alone.

On Sat.u.r.day nights the penny post closed, in winter at six, and in summer at seven. On other nights of the week, Sundays excepted, it must have remained open to at least 9 o'clock, for at that hour the country letters were collected from the receiving offices and carried to the General Post Office. Besides Sundays, there were eight days in the year on which the post did not go, viz. three days at Christmas, two days at Easter, two days at Whitsuntide, and also the 30th of January, the anniversary of the death of King Charles the First.

In spite of the enormous advantages it conferred, the penny post was not at first received with unqualified satisfaction. Some fanatics denounced it as a Popish contrivance; and Lord Macaulay tells us how the porters complained that their interests were attacked, and tore down the placards on which the scheme was announced to the public. Even unprejudiced persons and persons who had no interests to protect complained that a large number of things were posted and not delivered.

This Dockwra himself admitted, explaining that it was due to the illegible writing of the address or to the omission of some important particular by which the persons addressed might be identified, the omission of their trade, or of the signs which their houses bore, or of some well-known place or object in their vicinity. The manifest utility of the enterprise, however, soon bore down all opposition; and in little more than a year from its introduction the penny post, though weighted with a scheme of insurance, was very nearly paying its own expenses.

The establishment of the penny post had one effect which had probably not been contemplated. It increased largely the number of letters for the country. Every man had now a post office at his own door. It is true that Dockwra's four or five hundred receiving offices were intended primarily for town letters; but country letters might be posted there, and, as we have seen, were collected at a stated hour every evening.

Hitherto the case had been very different. Up to the 1st of April 1680, incredible as it may appear, the General Post Office in Lombard Street was the only receptacle for letters in the whole of London. There and nowhere else could letters be posted. Little wonder if, before 1680, persons whom the cost of postage might not deter from writing were yet deterred by their distance from the Post Office.

Dockwra might reasonably now expect to reap some of the rewards of success. A small band of citizens who had joined in the original venture had afterwards deserted him, and for six months he had carried it on at his sole charge. Others had then come to his aid, and a fresh partners.h.i.+p had been formed. The undertaking prospered, became self-supporting, and at length gave promise of large returns. This very promise excited the greed of the Duke of York. So long as the outgoings exceeded the receipts Dockwra remained unmolested; but no sooner had the balance turned than the Duke complained of his monopoly being infringed, and the Courts of Law decided in his favour. Not only was Dockwra cast in damages, but the undertaking which he had impoverished himself to establish was wrested out of his hands, and the penny post, in less than five years from its introduction, was incorporated into the General Post Office.[11]

[11] The exact date of incorporation is uncertain. The decision in the Court of King's Bench was given in Michaelmas term 1682; but the first public advertis.e.m.e.nt of the penny post does not appear to have been issued by the Postmaster-General until the 11th of March 1684/5.

Generosity formed no part of James's character, and, so long as he sat on the throne, Dockwra's services remained without the slightest recognition. In 1690, however, upon an address from the House of Commons, William and Mary granted him a pension of 500 for seven years, and in 1697 the grant was renewed for three years longer. In the same year as the renewal of the grant, but a little earlier, he was appointed comptroller of the penny post at a salary of 200, and this appointment he retained until 1700. Then, both appointment and grant came to an abrupt termination together, for, on charges brought against him by his own subordinates, Dockwra, like Witherings, was dismissed. Such was the tribute paid to the man who had conferred on his country benefits which he never tired of predicting would endure to all posterity.

Of the charges against Dockwra two deserve special notice, as shewing that the penny post, after its acquisition by the State, continued to be conducted on the same principles as before. These two charges were--1st, that, contrary to his duty, he "forbids the taking in any band-boxes (except very small) and all parcels above a pound"; and 2nd, that he takes money out of letters and "makes the office pay for it," thereby clearly indicating that at that time the State carried on a parcel post and continued the practice of making losses good. A third charge, the truth of which it is more easy to credit, imputed to Dockwra that he spoke and acted as if his object were to get the penny post into his own hands again. It is worthy of remark, as characteristic of the times in which he lived, and may perhaps be regarded as affording some presumption of his innocence, that Dockwra appears to have been at less pains to refute the charges than to prove that he had taken the oath of supremacy, or the oath which had been recently subst.i.tuted for it, and that he had received the Holy Sacrament.

We have said that to us who live at the end of the nineteenth century it may appear incredible that up to April 1680 the General Post Office in Lombard Street was the only receptacle for letters in the whole of London. But it is by no means certain that our descendants may not think it more incredible still that London, with all its boasted progress, has only now recovered a post which, in point of convenience and cheapness, at all approaches that which an enterprising citizen established more than two hundred years ago. When and under what circ.u.mstances this post lost its original features will have to be considered hereafter.

CHAPTER VI

COTTON AND FRANKLAND

_Inland Service_

1685-1705

In 1685, on the death of Charles the Second, the revenue of the Post Office was settled on James, his heirs and successors. Rochester, the High Treasurer, became postmaster-general; and for the actual discharge of the duties a deputy was appointed under the t.i.tle of Governor.

Two years before, the panic caused by the discovery of the Rye-House Plot had led to the issue of a Proclamation which, if differing little from others that had gone before, acquires importance from the circ.u.mstances under which it appeared. Unauthorised posts had again sprung up in all directions, simply, no doubt, because there was a demand for the accommodation they afforded; but the Government, no less than the persons who denounced Dockwra's undertaking as a Popish contrivance, seem to have been possessed with the idea that these posts were mere vehicles for the propagation of treason. To prevent treasonable correspondence was the avowed object of the present Proclamation, and the means by which the object was sought to be attained was the suppression of private and irregular posts, for by these, the Proclamation went on to declare, the conspirators had been materially a.s.sisted in their designs. Mayors, sheriffs, justices of the peace, constables and others were enjoined to make diligent search for letters pa.s.sing otherwise than through the regular post. Special officers were to be appointed for the same purpose. All such letters, wherever discovered, were to be deemed to be "of dangerous consequence"; and not only were they to be seized and carried to the Secretary of State or the Privy Council for the purpose of being opened and inspected, but both the bearers and senders of them were to be proceeded against at law.

On James's accession to the throne the Proclamation of 1683 was succeeded by another in almost identical terms; and it is certain that during his reign the liberties taken with post letters were hardly less than they had been in the worst days of the Commonwealth. Only a few months before Rochester's dismissal, for no better reason than to gratify curiosity, orders were given that the bags from Scotland should be transmitted to Whitehall, and during a whole week not a single private letter from beyond the Tweed was delivered in London. Happily, however, this state of things was soon to cease. After the Revolution the appointment of postmaster-general was conferred upon persons who were otherwise unconnected with affairs of State, and the effect of this change was, as William no doubt intended, at once to lift the Post Office out of the region of politics. In the eyes of the Rochesters, the Arlingtons, and the Thurloes, busied as they were in the detection of conspiracies against the State, the Post Office had been little else than an instrument which might be usefully employed as a means to that end. With plain citizens unversed in the ways of government, the only consideration was how best they could accomplish the object for which they had been appointed; and this object was so to manage and improve the posts of the country as to secure to their Sovereign the highest possible revenue.

But, before William could give effect to his views, there was an adherent to be provided for. This was Colonel John Wildman, who was appointed postmaster-general in July 1689. Of Wildman's career at the Post Office little is known, except that he was profuse in making promises which he never performed. He might, perhaps, himself have pleaded that he was not given time to perform them, for after eight months' tenure of the appointment he was dismissed for some reason which is, and will probably continue to be, a mystery. Far different is the record left behind them by Wildman's immediate successors. These were Sir Robert Cotton and Mr.--afterwards Sir Thomas--Frankland, who became joint postmasters-general in March 1690, and served in that capacity for nearly twenty years. They had sat in James's Parliament, the one for Cambridges.h.i.+re, and the other for the borough of Thirsk, and these seats they retained under William. From the writings they have left behind them we are able to see these two men not as a biographer might dress them up, but as they really were. Everything about them, their virtues, their foibles, their habits, their ailments, their devotion to duty, their unwillingness to believe evil of any one, their hatred of injustice or oppression, their unbounded credulity, their anxiety about their re-election, their grat.i.tude for any little sc.r.a.p of news which they might carry to Court, their fondness for a gla.s.s of port wine, their attacks of gout, their habit of taking snuff, even the hour of their going to bed--all this and more is there revealed, and makes up a record of simplicity and benevolence which it is a delight to read.

The establishment over which these two simple gentlemen were called upon to preside had recently received a considerable addition. Out of London, the Post Office servants remained much as they had been ten years before, at about 239 in number, of whom all but twelve were postmasters; but in London the force employed at the General Post Office had been raised from 77 to 185. The Penny Post Office, which had now been wrested out of Dockwra's hands, accounts for the greater part of the difference.

This gave employment, exclusive of receivers, to 74 persons--a comptroller, an accomptant, and a collector, 14 sorters and 57 messengers--at a total charge for salaries of 2000 a year. Another part of the establishment, and by no means the least important or the least difficult to manage, consisted of the packet boats. These, in 1690, were eleven in number, viz.--two for France, two for Flanders, two for Holland, two for the Downs, and three for Ireland. Owing to the war, however, the boat-service to France was now in abeyance.

Little more than half a century had elapsed since the introduction of postage, and meanwhile the revenue had risen by strides which were for those times prodigious. In 1635 the posts were maintained at a cost to the Crown of 3400 a year. Within fifteen years not only had they become self-supporting, but a rent was paid for the privilege of farming them.

This rent was, in 1650, 5000 a year; in 1653, 10,000; in 1660, 21,500; and some time before 1680, 43,000. In 1690 the net revenue was probably about 55,000. In 1694, according to a return made to the House of Commons two years later, it was 59,972.

The headquarters of the Post Office were at this time in Lombard Street.

Here the postmasters-general resided; and here, far from shutting themselves up, they were to be found at all hours by any one who might wish to consult them on business connected with their office. Freedom of communication with those among whom they lived, and not inaccessibility, appears indeed to have been a part of their policy. With the foreign merchants especially they maintained the most friendly intercourse, and were wont to defer to their wishes and suggestions in the arrangement of the packets. Besides giving constant attendance during the day, the postmasters-general sat as a Board every morning and night. To these Board-meetings they attached the highest importance, especially on the nights of Tuesdays, Thursdays, and Sat.u.r.days, when mails were despatched into all parts of the country. These were known as the "Grand Post Nights," and the others as "Bye-Nights."

The Post Office building appears to have been not ill adapted to its purpose. A ma.s.sive gate opened into a court of oblong shape. This court was paved from end to end for the merchants to walk in while waiting to receive their letters. On the right was the Board-room with the residence of the postmasters-general attached; on the left the office for foreign letters; and in front, immediately facing the entrance, was the sorting office. The office for the letter-carriers was in the bas.e.m.e.nt. The rest of the building was devoted to the use of the Post Office servants, who, owing to their unseasonable hours of attendance, were required to live in the office itself or else in its immediate vicinity.

The machinery for the dispersion of letters was very simple. For Post Office purposes the kingdom was divided into six roads--the North Road, the Chester or Holyhead Road, the Western Road, the Kent Road, and the Roads to Bristol and to Yarmouth; and these roads were presided over by a corresponding number of clerks in London whose duty it was to sort the letters and to tax them with the proper amount of postage. At the present time, when, owing to the system of prepayment, there is comparatively little taxing to be done, no less than 2800 clerks and sorters are engaged every evening in despatching the letters into the country. Two hundred years ago the whole operation was performed, both sorting and taxing together, by the six clerks of the roads, and they had not even a sorter to a.s.sist them until 1697.