The post office and its story

by Edward Bennett

Sir Rowland Hill asked Lord Lichfield very pertinently whether the size of the building should be regulated by the amount of correspondence or the amount of correspondence by the size of the building.

One of the most curious arguments was that the British public would object to prepayment, that it was contrary to their habits and customs. There was no doubt something to be said for the idea that when you wrote a letter you had all the trouble, and you were conferring a benefit on your friend, who ought to be prepared to pay for it.

The plan triumphed. The Committee appointed to consider it recommended its adoption, and it was incorporated in the Budget of 1839. Lord Melbourne was the Prime Minister, and though not enthusiastic, was favourable. The strong feelings aroused in official circles are suggested by Lord Melbourne's remark after interviewing the Postmaster-General the day before the Bill was introduced into the House of Lords. “Lichfield has been here,” said Lord Melbourne. “Why a man cannot talk of penny postage without getting into a passion, passes my understanding.”

The Bill received the royal assent on the 17th August 1839, and after a preliminary experiment had been tried of a uniform rate of 1d. for London and 4d. for the rest of the country, in order to accustom the clerks to the system, a uniform rate of 1d. for letters not exceeding half an ounce was introduced on the 10th January. This was a busy day at post offices all over the country, and the opportunity was seized by hundreds of people to write letters to one another in honour of the occasion. About 112,000 packets were posted in London. A large number of letters were also written to Rowland Hill himself from all parts of the country, congratulating him and thanking him for his efforts. Tradesmen and business men were especially grateful for the Bill. Moreover the reform opened the doors of the Post Office to the poorer classes. The postman after 1840 was, it was said, “making long rounds through humble districts where heretofore his knock was rarely heard.”

Rowland Hill was appointed to a post at the Treasury in 1840, in order to superintend the introduction of his scheme. He retired, however, in 1842, after Lord Melbourne's Ministry went out of office. On the return of the Liberals to power in 1846 he was appointed one of the Secretaries to the Postmaster-General, and in the same year he was presented by the public with £13,360 in gratitude for his services. In 1854 he was made Chief Secretary of the Post Office, and in 1862 he received the honour of knighthood. When he retired from the Post Office in 1864 he received from Parliament a grant of £20,000, and he was also allowed to retain his full salary of £2000 a year as retiring pension. In 1864 he received the degree of D.C.L. from the University of Oxford, and in 1879 he was granted the freedom of the City of London. He died in August of the same year, and was buried in Westminster Abbey.

Many and great were the reforms introduced into the Post Office during Sir Rowland Hill's period of service as Secretary. In his letter of retirement addressed to the Lords of the Treasury in 1864, he gave an account of his stewardship in a statement entitled “Results of Post Office Reform.” If we quote largely from this document it will be to show what Sir Rowland Hill claimed to have done, and it will also help the reader to understand from his own experience how far the Post Office has advanced since Sir Rowland Hill's day. First of all, Sir Rowland claimed “a very large reduction in the rates of postage on all correspondence, whether inland, foreign, or colonial. As instances in point it may be stated that letters are now conveyed from any part of the United Kingdom to any other part—even from the Channel Islands to the Shetland Isles—at one-fourth of the charge previously levied on letters passing between post towns only a few miles apart, and that the rate formerly charged for the slight distance—viz. fourpence—now suffices to carry a letter from any part of the United Kingdom to any part of France, Algeria included.”

Then Sir Rowland claimed “the almost universal resort to prepayment of correspondence, and that by means of stamps,” the establishment of the book post, the reduction in the fee for registered letters from 1s. to 4d., a reduction in the price of money orders combined with a great extension and improvement of the system, a more frequent and more rapid communication between the Metropolis and the larger provincial towns, as also between one provincial town and another, a vast extension of the rural distribution, and many other facilities for the public, including the establishment of Post Office Savings Banks. He goes on to say: “The expectations I held out before the change were that eventually under the operation of my plans the number of letters would increase fivefold, the gross revenue would be the same as before, while the net revenue would sustain a loss of about £300,000. The actual figures show that the letters have increased not fivefold but nearly eight and a half fold, that the gross revenue, instead of remaining the same, has increased by about £1,500,000; while the net revenue, instead of falling £300,000, has risen more than £100,000.”

This was written more than twenty years after the introduction of penny postage, but it must not be supposed that the reform was an immediate financial success. The last complete year (1839) of the old system of high rates yielded a profit of £1,659,000. The first complete year of the new system produced only £500,789. But in two years the number of chargeable letters passing through the post had increased from 72,000,000 per annum to 208,000,000, and in a few years the profit of 1839 had been passed.

Sir Rowland was a fighter and reformer to the last. Like all men who accomplish great things, he was exceedingly self-confident and impatient of opposition. The official mind works from precedent to precedent, and Sir Rowland proposed to make all things new. Effort after effort was made to push him aside without any lasting success. He was dismissed from the Treasury in the second year of penny postage, at a time when its very success seemed to depend on friends, not foes, directing the organisation. Thomas Hood wrote to him: “I have seen so many instances of folly and ingratitude similar to those you have met with that it would never surprise me to hear of the railway people, some day, finding their trains running on so well, proposing to discharge the engines.” It was more in obedience to the feeling of the country than to any liking for the reformer that the Government of the day appointed him to the Post Office four years after his dismissal from the Treasury.

Sir Rowland was always perhaps a little uncomfortable as a Post Office chief. He was in the midst of men against whom he had been working for years, and there are many stories in existence of his caustic way of dealing with his staff. Anthony Trollope, who was in the service of the Post Office at the time, ventured one day to point out to Sir Rowland that the language in a certain report, if literally construed, might be held to mean what was not intended. Sir Rowland replied: “You must be aware, Mr. Trollope, that a phrase is not always intended to bear a literal construction. For instance, when I write to one of you gentlemen, I end my letter with the words, 'I am, Sir, your obedient servant,' whereas you know I am nothing of the sort.” Indeed nobody could have used this official phrase with less sincerity than Sir Rowland Hill.