IN my former Notes I alluded to the Post Office. Well, the first Post
Office I recollect was a little room about 10ft. square—I think it has
been altered since—in one of those houses at the back of the “White Lion”
gates. An old gentleman lived there who was Postmaster, and I think he
was assisted, being rather infirm, by his daughter, and I have been told
it was the amusement of a little grandchild or a little boy accustomed to
visit him, that by way of a treat he was allowed to catch letters in his
pinafore, and as a grand treat he was allowed to stamp them. At that
time the Post Office establishment consisted of the Postmaster, the lady
who assisted him, and the letter carrier, who, as some of you recollect,
was Mrs. Waterfield, a tidy woman, who had a little basket in which she
carried letters. By degrees the establishment got on. You will bear in
mind that at that time we were not troubled with Post Office Orders.
There was no way of conveying 5s. or 6s. in stamps, or by order, from one
part of the country to another. The present Post Office consists of
palatial buildings, since their enlargement in 1904, and great
departmental accommodation, the smallest room of which is larger than
that old Post Office altogether. It would not do now to catch letters in
a pinafore, as their number is many millions a month. There are
telegraph messages, Post Office Orders, and Savings Bank business. The
Postmaster and old woman have grown into a Postmaster at £500 a year,
Chief Clerk, a very important personage, the Assistant Superintendent
(Postal Department), the Assistant Superintendent (Telegraph Department),
7 controllers, and a staff numbering altogether nearly 350, with 66
sub-Post Offices—a pretty good number. A great deal of the business is
forwarding mails passing through Peterborough, as a convenient centre for
such purposes.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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