The History of the Post Office in British North America

by William Smith

At the instance of the department at Washington, the general post office agreed to send by the Canadian steamers the correspondence for both the eastern and western States, and also agreed to Smith's request for special trains for the mail service from London to Cork. This special railway service, with its connecting mail boat service across the Irish Channel gave the British public a full business day more to prepare their correspondence for the States.

The mails had, in ordinary course, to be prepared in London early Wednesday morning to catch the outgoing steamer which left Liverpool the same evening, but the special train from Dublin to Cork enabled correspondents to hold over their urgent letters until Wednesday evening and send them by the evening mail to Ireland, where connection was made on Thursday morning with the steamer which had left Liverpool on the previous evening.

But this was not the only, or perhaps the greatest, of the advantages of the scheme. Transatlantic cables were still in the future, but the telegraphic systems on both sides of the Atlantic were fully developed, and messages for New York or Montreal could be addressed to the steamer, which would deliver them at Father Point, on its way up the St. Lawrence, from there they were sent by telegraph to their destination.

One of the leading London papers declared that the plan would save two full days for telegrams, and permit transactions on the stock exchange in London up to Thursday afternoon to be communicated to the stock exchanges in the United States on the Saturday of the following week, and the action taken in these centres transmitted to London by the Canadian steamers leaving Quebec the same day.

Having completed these arrangements in London, Smith next addressed himself to the postal administrations of France, Belgium and Prussia. In the month that had elapsed since the negotiations with London had been concluded, the steamers had crossed the Atlantic both ways, and the Canadian postmaster general was able to inform the continental administrations that on the first voyage the mails from Chicago had reached London in twelve days, and that the conveyance from New Orleans, in which France had a special interest, ought to be effected in less than fifteen days.

The French government, to whom Smith offered the same terms for conveyance by steamer and railway in Canada as had been accepted in the United States, immediately closed with Smith on these terms, subject to the consent of Great Britain. In a few days Belgium took similar action, while Prussia deferred acceptance until the postmaster general of Canada could confer with the United States.

Entirely satisfied with the success of his mission to the Continent, Smith returned to London to conclude the transaction by obtaining the permission of the British post office to act as intermediary for the payments which would be made by the French and other Continental governments to Canada for the conveyance of their mails to America.

The necessity for having Great Britain as the intermediary for the settlement of these accounts arose from the following considerations. Great Britain had open accounts with all these countries. The mails from these countries were carried to the United States by British steamers, for which they became indebted to the British government; while on the other hand mails from Great Britain for the countries of eastern Europe and for India, passed over one or other of these countries through their postal systems, which gave rise to an indebtedness on the part of Great Britain.

Under conventions with each of them, settlements were made from time to time. None of this accounting machinery existed between Canada and any of these countries. The only country in Europe with which Canada had an open account was Great Britain.

In consequence of Canada's isolation in this respect the only way these countries could settle their debts to Canada was by direct payments. This, however, would involve legislation, at least in the case of France, which would have delayed the beginning of the plans for many months. Canada, therefore, had but one way open, which was to ask the British post office to receive from France the amounts due by that country to Canada, and apply these sums to the account between Great Britain and Canada.