The Bristol Head Post Office in 1899. From a photograph by Mr. Protheroe, Wine Street, Bristol.
The Council dropped the matter of removal, and an enlargement of the Post Office was commenced in 1886 on 5,500 square feet of ground on which the Rectory House of St. Mary Werburgh formerly stood. The enlargement was completed in 1889. The structure was designed by the Surveyor of Her Majesty's Office of Works. In making his plan in 1868 no doubt the Surveyor thought he was building for, at least, fifty years; and so he set back his building to form a square structure, instead of following the line of street as laid down by the city authorities in their Act of Parliament. The new part of the building had to conform to the city line, and had, therefore, to be built at an angle with the old office, which detracts from the general appearance. The Post Office building in Small
Street stands on a site 17,300 square feet in extent; and now, thirty-one years from the opening of the new office and ten years from its enlargement, further extension is necessary, and the erection of a second or supplementary office larger in dimensions than the present structure is about to be proceeded with.
As the work in the Post Office goes on through the whole day and night, the air in the working rooms became vitiated and over-heated when lighted with gas. In 1896 the effectual remedy of abandoning the use of gas and adopting electric light was carried out. The Corporation provides the current. The lamps used are 4 arc lamps, of approximately 750 candle-power each, and 450 glow lamps of 8, 16, or 25 candle-power.
Two million gallons of water a year are used to keep the buildings clean.
As the Post Office, from its size, if not from its architectural beauty, dominates Small Street in some measure it may be well here to introduce particulars from an ancient manuscript in the City Library, which show that Small Street has been a street ever since Anglo-Saxon times. About
Small Street and St. Leonard's Lane lived some of Bristol's greatest merchants. For hundreds of years there was not within the walls of Bristol a more fashionable street than Small Street. Many of the mansions there had good gardens. In the reign of Charles II. there were only six houses on the west, or Post Office, side of the street. Amongst the worthies who resided there were the Colstons, the Creswicks, the Kitchens, the Seymours, the Esterfields, the Codringtons, the Haymans, the Kilkes; John Foster, the founder of the almshouse on St. Michael's Hill; Nicholas Thorne, one of the founders of our Grammar School; and Thomas Fenn, attorney, who in 1762 succeeded to the Earldom of Westmoreland. It is not indicated whether he was related in any way to William Fenn, who was postmaster, 1778-88, but it might have been so, for William Fenn must have been a person of some note or the appointment would not at his death have been conferred on his widow. In Small Street, too, more Royal and noble visitors have lodged and received hospitality than in any other street in Bristol. The Earl of Bedford and his son were received there in 1569, and Robert
Dudley, Earl of Leicester, one of Queen Elizabeth's favourites, and the Earl of Warwick, in 1587; the latter lodged at Robert Kitchen's. In 1643 King Charles I., with Prince Charles and the Duke of York, lodged there, so did Oliver Cromwell and his wife in 1649; and James II., with George, Prince of Denmark, and the Dukes of Grafton, Beaufort, and Somerset, in 1688. Queen Catherine was entertained at Sir Henry Creswick's house in 1677, where Sir Henry, the Lord Lieutenant of Ireland, the good and great Duke of Ormonde, lodged for several days in 1665. We learn that Small Street was selected for the reception of these illustrious visitors "by reason of the conveniency of the street for entertaining the nobility."