The Bristol Royal Mail Part 11

Recently many valuable dogs were poisoned in different parts of the city, and a suggestion appeared in the newspapers that the postmen might be urged to const.i.tute themselves amateur detectives for the discovery of the miscreants, on the ground that they enter every garden and knock at every door throughout the length and breadth of Bristol, and that at early morn and late at night as well as by day. The postmen are public spirited, but it is hardly likely that they would go considerably out of their way for the purpose, considering the risks which they run from dogs and the annoyances to which they are subjected to by them. The postmen have to face the snappish terrier and the ferocious-looking bulldog. Not infrequently they get bitten, and more frequently get soundly abused if, for their own protection, they belabour a dog occasionally, or give it a taste of their belt for want of a better weapon of defence or offence. Reciprocity would demand that if the postmen look out for dog poisoners, the owners of dogs on their part should take the utmost care to keep their dogs properly secured when known to be dangerous or to have a special dislike to the public servants in blue. The bold announcement given on the pillar of a gateway of a residence in a fashionable suburb of Bristol, "Beware of the bulldog," is not calculated to give confidence to the postmen who have to deliver the letters. One poor dog, well known in the city, fell dead in Small Street; and as the dog had just been seen to visit the Post Office, and even to drink from a Bristol Dogs' Home trough standing in the portico, it was a.s.sumed by the many spectators of the poodle's sad death that he had come to an untimely end through drinking poisoned water from the Post Office trough. The vessel was therefore confiscated by an over-zealous supporter of the Dogs' Home, and the water was subjected to a.n.a.lysis, but investigation proved that it was innocuous, although from an examination it transpired that the dog really had died from poison, which had, however, been taken in meat.

A London firm made indignant enquiry as to why a letter had been returned to them through the Returned Letter Office, seeing that it was addressed to a well-known and distinguished baronet living near Bristol.

It turned out that the right hon. gentleman was himself the cause of the return of the letter, as he read the contracted words "Rt. Honb.," in a line preceding his own name, as the name of "Robt. Hunt," a person who lived near his mansion, and he gave the letter back to the postman with the foregoing result. In 1847 a letter indicative of the times, with the following superscription, as noticed in the post:--"To the Post Office, Bristol, Somersetshire, England, 115 miles west of London, this letter is to be delivered to the Ladey that transported Jobe Smith and 2 others with him near Bristol." Members of the public complain from time to time in indignant terms respecting the loss of letters in the post, but in very many instances they afterwards write in meeker strain to say they have discovered the missing letters--in most unlikely places in their homes.

At a dinner given by officials of the Bristol Post Office, the Dean of Bristol bestowed praise on the postmen for success in conveying ill-addressed letters to their destination. Dr. Pigou cited their performances in his own case. He had been addressed as Pigue, Picken, Pigon, Pigour, Pickles, Peggue, Puegon, Ragou, and Pagan. That "Ragou"--not being a name beginning with "P"--should have reached him, he thought could only be explained as the result either of a flash of inspiration or of the recollection of previous "hashes" of his name; but "Pickles" evidently got home on the mere strength of its initial letter, and though, as he complained, it is hard lines to be addressed as "Dr.

Pagan" after having been thirty or forty years in orders, the written word would much more nearly resemble his real name than several of the other addresses which did find him. "The Head Gamekeeper, the Deanery, Bristol," was, of course, mysterious. The letter contained a circular advertising wire netting for pheasants, rabbits, and hares; and when the Dean replied, pointing out that the only s.p.a.ce available on his premises--an area of 30 ft. by 40 ft.--was too small to rear pheasants in, he received, a further circular recommending a trial of "our dog biscuits." Occasionally, also, the local postmen meet with letters so peculiarly addressed as that for "Mr. ----, Oction her and Countent, Corn Street, Bristol," and another for "Chowl, near Temple," intended for "Cholwell, near Temple Cloud." The postmen collect, too, letters peculiarly addressed to other places.

There are still a few postmen veterans in the Bristol Post Office who are toiling on long after having exceeded their "three score years."

Doubtless these aged men excite sympathy as they are seen on their daily rounds, and the thought presents itself to the public mind that the Post Office is harsh to make them labour when so far advanced in years. Such is not the case, however, as the men, unfortunately not being ent.i.tled to pensions, have been allowed to continue to perform their duties long after pensionable established men would have been retired, either willingly or compulsorily, under the regulations which now call for a Civil servant's retirement to be considered his reaching the age of sixty years. These old worthies are not Post Office short-service men; but, as their good conduct stripes testify, they have for long years served their Queen and country.

J. S., one of these life-long toilers, who worked as an uncovenanted postman for many years, commenced his career in the navy. When fifteen years of age (1844) he joined the gunnery ship _Excellent_ at Portsmouth, Captain (afterwards Admiral) Chade being then in command.

After serving two years, he was transferred to the old _Conway_, then engaged in putting down the slave trade in East African waters; and after three years on board that vessel he went to the brig _Helena_, and was with her in the West Indies for several years. In about 1854 he was pa.s.sed to the _Britannia_ for Mediterranean service. While sailing from Gibraltar to Malta, S. met with a serious accident. Being considered a smart young man, he was ordered by the captain to a.s.sist another "A.B."

to rig the topgallant yard-arm. While thus at work he fell from the maintopmast cross-trees into the main rigging, again to the main chains, and then overboard--a drop in all of 120 feet. A boat was lowered promptly, and he was soon picked up, but he was in an insensible condition. It was found on examination by the ship's surgeon that his skull was fractured. He went into hospital on arrival at Malta, and there he remained six months. Shortly after the accident, the _Britannia_, which was the Admiral's flagship, was ordered to the Crimea (1855), and not only did the seaman who took over S.'s gun meet with his death by the sh.e.l.ls from the fortifications at Sebastopol, but the whole of the gallant tars fighting on the starboard side of the ship were killed. S. was taken to London on board the _Growler_ (Sir Charles Wood), the first steamer he had ever seen, and was incapacitated for two or three years, but fortunately he obtained a pension on having to leave the navy. He was engaged in private life till 1878, when, at the age of 49 years, he was given Post Office work, on which he was employed for twenty years, and, indeed, until he again came to grief through an accident when on duty at Christmas, 1898. On this occasion he was knocked over by a cart in Victoria Street, which ran into the parcel handcart S. was wheeling, and which sent him flying into the mud and his parcels all about in the road. This put an end to his Post Office career, and the old man, with disabled body from his first accident and somewhat impaired faculty from the latter, has now sunk back into seclusion, and it is hoped that he may end his days in peace. Except for three weeks' illness caused by influenza, he was never away on sick leave out of his twenty years of Post Office service. Not once was S.

late at work. He was, he says, always out of bed at 3 a.m., and so punctual was he known to be that the remark was often made when he entered the office, that "We know what time it is without looking at the clock." On leaving the Post Office service this year (1899) a small gratuity was awarded him.

S. T., although in his 71st year, managed up till quite recently to perform Post Office work for a few hours daily. From early boyhood up to his 22nd year, T. was engaged at shoemaking in this city; then he enlisted and served as gunner and driver in the Royal Horse Artillery for three years. Having obtained his discharge from the army, he acted as policeman on the Great Western Railway for a few months. At the time of the Crimean War, T. again enlisted, this time as a seaman and gunner in Her Majesty's Navy. He was disabled in action and discharged with a life pension. For the next twenty-seven years he followed his former occupation of shoemaking and rounding, working for about twenty years for one firm in this city. When 53 years of age, he first obtained employment in the Post Office, working for a few hours daily, and receiving 10s. per-week. He is a member of the Crimean and Indian Veterans' a.s.sociation.

A Bristol Post Office benefit society was established in March, 1861. It became the Bristol Letter Carriers' Sick Benefit Society in 1862, and was carried on under that t.i.tle up to 1890 when it ceased.

Early in the year of 1896, the remains of the late Thomas Rutley, one of the oldest of Bristol postmen, were interred at Greenbank Cemetery.

About one hundred postmen, headed by the Post Office band, were in attendance to mark their sympathy, and respect to his memory. The Rev.

Moffat Logan conducted the service. Such a mark of respect is not always accorded to deceased Post Office servants. The writer recollects on a bright summer day having attended the funeral at Highgate Cemetery of one of the oldest and most respected superintendents in the Post Office, London. The good man was so much liked by those who served under him that he had gained for himself the name of "Honest John," yet there was only one other official besides the writer to stand by his graveside.

The postmen have a military band, composed of thirty members of their own staff. The primary object is to advance the art of music in the Post Office, and, secondarily, to provide concerts in the open s.p.a.ces in Bristol for the benefit of the public. A grand concert is given by the band every year, which is usually attended by some 3,000 of the inhabitants, attracted chiefly by the popularity of the Post Office and by the fame of artistes so eminent as Madame Ella Russell, Madame f.a.n.n.y Moody, Mr. Plunkett Greene, and others, who have from time to time been engaged.

The "D" Company of the 1st Volunteer Battalion Gloucester Regiment is composed almost exclusively of members of the Bristol Post Office. For three years in succession, (1894-5-6), this company won the first prize in the drill compet.i.tion and also first prize and challenge vase in the volley firing compet.i.tion. The company challenge bowl and first prize, and the brigadier's cup and third prize in the Western District of England, were also won by the company during the same period. For many years the Bristol Post Office has had two out of the nine representatives of the battalion competing for the Queen's Prize. The company has also been well represented in all the battalion and county shooting matches. Of the eight battalion signallers, five are Post Office men, who have on several occasions held first place in the Volunteer service annual examinations.

The postmen of Bristol maintain for the winter months two of the old veterans who are under the auspices of the Crimean and Indian Mutiny Veterans' a.s.sociation.

Mr. Goodenough Taylor, one of the proprietors of the _Times and Mirror_ newspaper, has kindly given a Ten Guinea Challenge Cup, to be raced for by Bristol postmen who use bicycles in connection with their Post Office business of delivering and collecting letters. The cup has to be won three years, not necessarily in succession, before it becomes the postman's sole property. The terms under which the compet.i.tion for the cup is held are as follows, viz.:--"Compet.i.tors to be postmen of any age or rank; appointed, unestablished, auxiliary, or sub-postmaster's a.s.sistant, of not less than two years' service, who have never won a prize in public compet.i.tion. Compet.i.tors to be certified as having in the course of the preceding twelve months, under official sanction or direction, ridden 150 miles in the execution of their official duties, or to and from the office when attending duty. The race to be a handicap race of two miles, to take place on the Gloucestershire County Ground or other enclosure during each year. The postmaster, a.s.sisted by experts in the Post Office service, to be the handicapper. The handicap to be framed on points of age, physical ability, and regard to be had to the weight or kind of bicycle to be used in compet.i.tion." Postman Newman, of Coalpit Heath, was the winner this year (1899).

The postmen have a library, consisting now of some 700 volumes. It was started in 1892. The writer made an appeal through the local press for gifts of books to form the nucleus of a library for the postmen and telegraph messengers attached to the Bristol Post Office. This appeal was liberally and promptly responded to by the residents of Bristol and Clifton. Warmest thanks are due to the newspaper proprietors for their kindness in inserting paragraphs relating to the subject, as, but for their powerful co-operation in the matter, the movement could not have been brought to a successful issue. A well-known literary gentleman at Clifton gave eighty volumes, Mr. Harold Lewis, B.A., showed his interest in the movement by the donation of 200 copies; and Mr. J. W. Arrowsmith has frequently given fifty volumes at a time. The postmen themselves manage the library, and contribute small sums weekly towards its maintenance and further development.

CHAPTER XVI.

POST LETTER BOXES: POSITION, VIOLATION, PECULIAR USES.

The three hundred and fifty pillar and wall letter boxes are placed at convenient points, regard being had to the wants of the immediate neighbourhood that each has to serve--to approach by paved crossings, to contiguity to a public lamp, to being out of the way of pedestrians and as far removed from mud-splashing as possible. At the same time, the inspectors endeavour to place the boxes so that they may be an attraction, rather than an eyesore, to the spot where erected.

The sign of "The Pillar Box" has been given to a public-house before which a Post Office box stands. Occasionally the Post Office letter boxes are greatly misused. Some little time since a woman in Bristol was savage enough to drop oil of vitriol, nitric acid, and other dangerous fluids into the boxes. She even poured paraffin into the letter box at a post office, and dropped an ignited match in after it. A conflagration was only averted by the fortunate circ.u.mstance of the postman clearing the box just in time to extinguish the commencing fire. The woman's determination is evidenced from the fact that her hands were severely burned by the strong acid she used; but, notwithstanding this, she continued night after night to carry on her dastardly work. She was found out after much anxious watching, and having, on trial, been found guilty, she was sentenced by a lenient judge to six months'

imprisonment. She would a.s.sign no reason for her incomprehensible behaviour even when asked by the judge in court. Not infrequently, mischievous children place lighted matches, rubbish, etc., in the Post Office letter boxes, and in the letter boxes of private houses and warehouses. The Post Office officials are always on the alert to discover the delinquents. It is desirable also that the public, in their own interests, should call the attention of postmen and the police at once to any case in which they may observe letter boxes being tampered with. It may not be generally known that offences of this kind are punishable by imprisonment under the Post Office Protection Act.

A remarkable case was that of a servant who was a somnambulist, and who for some time wrote letters in her sleep, night after night, and took them to adjacent letter boxes to post. Sometimes she was fully attired, and at other times only partially so. As a rule, the letters were properly addressed, but the girl did not always place postage stamps upon them.

Occasionally the postmen have to encounter the difficulties arising from a frost-bound letter box. Such a case occurred with a box situated on the summit of the Mendip Hills. The letter box and the wall in which the box is built were found by the postman to be covered with ice, caused by rain and snow having frozen on them. The door resisted all his efforts to open it, and he had to leave it for the night. On making another effort when morning came, it taxed his ingenuity and that of other interested and willing helpers to get the box open. Hot water was tried, paraffin was poured into the lock, and it was only after a hammer had been used and a fire in a movable grate had been applied for a time that the lid could be opened.

A letter box erected in a brick pillar in a secluded spot on the East Harptree road, about a mile distant from any habitation, was, late one night, damaged to the extent of having its iron door completely smashed off, apparently either by means of a large stone which lay at its base when the violation was discovered, or by means of a hammer and jemmy.

Although the adjacent ground, ditches, and hedges were searched, no trace of the iron door could be found. As three roysterers were known to have pa.s.sed the box on the night in question, it was a.s.sumed that the damage was done by them out of pure mischief and not from any desire to rob Her Majesty's mails. Whether such were the case or not, they had the unpleasant experience of being locked up over the Sunday on suspicion.

CHAPTER XVII.

RURAL DISTRICT SUB-POSTMASTERS. RURAL POSTMEN. INCIDENTS.

The Bristol postal area is an extensive one, the distance from point to point being thirty miles, with width ranging from five to twelve miles.

It is bounded on one side by the river Severn, from a point about five miles below Sharpness to a point close to Portishead; thence the boundary stretches across country to the Mendip Hills, up to Cheddar Cliffs; then from a point four miles north-east of Wells to Newton-St.-Loe, near Bath; across the river Avon, under Lansdown, thence in a line by Pucklechurch, Iron Acton, and Thornbury across to the starting-point on the Severn. The large rural area is for the greater part agricultural in character, but there are collieries and stone quarries in some few districts.

At the Bristol town and rural sub-Post Offices there are 554 a.s.sistants of all kinds employed. Many rural sub-postmasters act as postmen; in the main it is a healthy occupation, and proves a very good antidote to sedentary employment, although there are hardships to be borne, as the toil has to be undergone in all weathers--the scorching sun of summer, the pitiless cold of winter--in rain, hail, and snow. In connection With the Early Closing Movement, at some of the outer Post Offices business is suspended at 5.0 on one day in the week--usually Wednesday.

In the suburban and rural districts there are 105 sub-Post Offices, and 78 of them are letter delivery offices, served by an aggregate number of 226 postmen. Of the 78 districts, 42 have two daily deliveries 28 three, and 6 four, with about a corresponding number of collections.

The sorting clerks and telegraphists at head-quarters gain some sort of acquaintance with sub-postmasters through daily communication by mail bag and wire; also in the pa.s.sage of reports and counter-reports; but occasionally people performing postal work throughout the extensive Bristol district are brought into closer harmony and touch with each other by means of social functions, such as "outings" and Bristol Channel steamer trips, when town and country officials take their pastime in company, and the sub-postmasters and sub-postmistresses of the Somersetshire portion of the district get acquainted with those of the Gloucestershire side, and all with the head office officials. By these means of friendly intercourse and interchange of kindly feeling, the service is much benefited. As an indication of this exchange of courtesy, the felicitations exchanged by telegram when the first annual trip by steamer to Ilfracombe was taken ran thus:--

"From Postmaster, Bristol.--Pleasant journey to you. Long may Sub-Postmasterly friendship continue."

"From Sub-Postmasters at Ilfracombe.--Telegram received. Thanks for good wishes. Have just drank your good health. Pleasant trip. Regret your absence extremely.--Sub-Postmasters."

The Bristol Post Office has only recently had electric light introduced, but the squire of East Harptree had long before set the good example of progress by having the Post Office in his village illuminated by electricity. In the Bristol area very many villages have their little counterpart of the huge combination shops in London, where the villager is enabled to procure everything that his modest income will allow him to purchase. It is at these village "Whiteleys" that the Post Office is generally to be found, and a surveying officer may soon become well versed in the qualities of bacon, cheese, bread, flour, candles, and get a knowledge of rakes, p.r.o.ngs, and besoms, without much difficulty. In other instances no business except that of Post Office work is carried on.

The picture of the sub-Post Office at Cribbs Causeway, five miles from Bristol, may give our readers who are "in cities pent" an idea of a delightful place for the sale of postage stamps and postal orders and the distribution of letters. This unique Post Office has few houses anywhere near it, but it serves a large, albeit very spa.r.s.ely populated, area. Some of its interest rests in the fact that it was formerly the half-way inn on the once important highway from Bristol to New Pa.s.sage, for the ferry over the Severn into South Wales. Some of our elderly readers may probably recollect it as the stopping stage of the coaches which ran prior to the introduction of the railway system. The sub-Post Office, which stands on high ground, is held by two sisters, who went to it as a health resort from a farm in the low-lying Severn marsh. They act as postwomen, and brisk exercise and the early morning dew has brought such roses to their cheeks as would be envied by their Post Office sisters whose fate it is to reside in smoke-begrimed regions.

[Ill.u.s.tration: CRIBBS CAUSEWAY POST OFFICE.]

Although some of the Bristol district villages are situated at a long distance from town and remote from main roads, yet only one of the Post Offices presents the primitive condition of having a thatched roof. None of the rural postmen now avail themselves on their journeys of the services of that faithful creature, the donkey; but the last animal so used was on the road until 1890, when its master, poor Sims, the Congresbury to Shipham postman, shuffled off this mortal coil. Times change, and our manners change with them; so also do our tests for gold coins. At the Wrington Post Office there are bra.s.s testing weights, for sovereigns and half-sovereigns, inscribed "Royal Mint, 1843," such as have not been observed by the writer at any other Post Office, either in the Bristol district or in London. A certain sub-postmistress in the district has for many years been in the habit of keeping her sheets of reserve postage stamps in a large Family Bible. Not that she is irreverent--indeed, she is a pious woman,--but, being a lone widow, she has kept them in that manner for safety, as she imagines that no burglar would look for them in such a depository.

[Ill.u.s.tration: MR. EDWARD BIDDLE.

(_Sub-Postmaster of Rudgeway._)

_Photographed by Mr. Protheroe, Narrow Wine Street, Bristol, from an oil painting._]

A notable man in his day was Edward Biddle, on the Thornbury side of Bristol. Mr. Biddle was sub-postmaster of Rudgeway for over forty years, and occupied the post until his death in 1889, at the ripe age of 91 years, when he was succeeded by his daughter, and she, in turn, was succeeded by his son, William Biddle, who still holds the appointment.

Prior to becoming sub-postmaster, Mr. Edward Biddle was "Pike" keeper at Stone, and used to pay 752 per annum for his post. There he had to open his gate to no fewer than twenty mail coaches daily, on their way between Bristol and Gloucester. At Rudgeway he carried on the joint occupation of sub-postmaster and innkeeper, at a tavern where the Post Office business had been conducted for many years before he succeeded to it; but the innkeeping business had in course of time to be given up, under Post Office regulations. Mr. Elstone, of Alveston House, wrote expressing his satisfaction that the Post Office was to be carried on at a private house, and not as previously at a "roadside pothouse," which all the district considered a very improper place. At that time John Blann and other stage carriers drove their unwieldy waggons, drawn by four strong cart-horses at a walking pace, along the Gloucester turnpike road. The waggons were indeed the goods trains of olden times. The present sub-postmaster, the son of Edward Biddle, who has had for many years to use "Shanks's" pony in the delivery of letters, was engaged in olden times in going on horseback down to the Pa.s.sage to take, in saddlebags, the mails for South Wales and receive them therefrom. As late as 1850, letters from Rudgeway for Bristol were impressed with a stamp thus:--

BRISTOL 4 JA 50.

BY POST.

Mr. James Tiley, the village blacksmith of Clutton, now an octogenarian, calls to mind that sixty years ago the letters for Clutton, Temple Cloud, Stowey, Bishop Sutton and adjacent districts were delivered from Old Down, a hamlet on the main coach road from Bath to Wells, distant from Tyburn Turnpike, London, 121 miles. Mr. Tiley has had the luxury of paying 10d. for a letter brought from London by the above means; and as it was dear to him at the time, it is dear to him now in another sense as a reminiscence of the past. Mr. Tiley recalls the sending of letters of the district by waggoners to Bristol or Bath to save the postage, and slyly remarks: "So stupid were the waggoners that as often as not they brought the letters back again, having forgotten to--what Post Office people now term--'properly dispose of them.'" Also that Joseph Tippett, a postman of the olden time, was brutally a.s.saulted on Stowey Hill, and nearly lost his life and his letters. His a.s.sailants were discovered and were transported for life. The Old Down postman was timed to reach Temple Cloud Bridge at 12.0, and always blew horn or whistle to let the village schoolmaster know the time of day. During the Bristol riots the arrival of the mail every morning was eagerly awaited by persons far and near, anxious to hear the latest news.

So recently as the year 1867, a postman had to trudge right away from Bristol to the distant village of Chew Stoke, having to breast the steep hill of Dundry and pa.s.s through Chew Magna on his way. All the letters and newspapers then delivered at Bishopsworth, Dundry, Chew Magna and Chew Stoke were carried by this man. Now, with the introduction of the parcel post and a cheaper letter post, and consequently increased weight, the morning mail is carried in a mail cart, and that service is supplemented by two or three other despatches to Chew Magna and Chew Stoke by train _via_ Pensford. The hamlets of Breach Hill, Moreton and Herons Green were at that time unserved by the postman officially, and if delivered privately by him he charged for them at the rate of an extra penny each. The residents in those outlying districts who did not get their letters delivered in that way, and who did not call for them at the Chew Stoke Post Office, usually obtained them--two, three, or four days old--from the postman on Sundays, who stationed himself at the church door to oblige such worshippers. Some of the older country postmen say that in by-gone days the poor people, unable to read themselves, considered it part of a postman's duty to read their letters for them, and they looked for sympathy from the postmen in case of receipt of bad news. The Chew Stoke postman had a walk, in and out, of over twenty miles, and had to carry whatever load there was for the route. The pay attached to the post was small. This was in the good (?) days of not so long ago, but the postman who then had to take the journey is by no means anxious for a return to them, for now he receives double the amount of pay then allowed. He was out from five o'clock in the morning till seven or eight o'clock at night; but now he performs his eight hours' duty straight off, and has, therefore, more time at home for his private purposes.