PRIMITIVE POST OFFICE.--FIFTH CLAUSE POSTS.--MAIL CART IN A
RHINE.--EFFECT OF GALES ON POST AND TELEGRAPH SERVICE.
The Bristol Postal District, stretching from the Severn banks beyond
Oldbury-on-Severn to a point near Bath, and thence straight across to
the Bristol Channel again, consists of ground within the City and County
of Bristol, and the Counties of Gloucestershire and Somersetshire. The
border of Wiltshire is touched near Dyrham and Badminton, and the
district is separated from Monmouthshire by the estuary of the River
Severn.
[Illustration: HORTON THATCHED POST OFFICE AT THE FOOT OF COTSWALD
HILLS.]
Post Offices showing signs of great antiquity are scarcely in existence
now, for at the present day the wide district thus described in the
preceding paragraph contains within its boundaries only one post office
established under the primitive but comfortable and picturesque
thatched roof. This is the Horton Post Office. The picture of this post
office is from an excellent photograph taken by Miss Begbie, a daughter
of the Rector of Horton. The village lies at the foot of the Cotswolds,
and near this spot, in quiet retreat, William Tyndale translated the New
Testament. The Duke of Beaufort's hounds meet from time to time in the
Horton Post Office yard. This rustic place was originally the village
ale house, yclept "The Horse Shoe." It is now devoted to the more useful
purpose of the sale of stamps and the posting and distribution of
letters, under the able and energetic superintendence of Mrs. Slade.
Such Postal Sub-Districts as Horton, far remote from their principal
centre, were classified under Parliamentary legislation. Thus the fifth
Clause posts of early in the 19th Century took their name from the Act
41, Geo. 3, Ch. 7, Clause 5, under which they were established. Special
post marks were in use for such posts. In the case of the Bristol
district there was only one 5th Clause post, namely, at Thornbury, which
was established in 1825, and under its regulations one penny was
charged for the delivery of each letter at Thornbury. The post was a
horse post from and to Bristol, and the Contractor delivered and
collected bags at Almondsbury and Fylton, which were both "penny posts."
The main object of the fifth Clause post was to join up small towns with
the larger post towns and so it was that Thornbury became thus linked on
to Bristol. On the other hand, Bristol had 63 penny posts, including
Almondsbury and Fylton, which were denoted by numbers 1 to 63, Clifton
being No. 1.
Of the 52 "Fifth Clause Posts" existing in 1839 Bristol had only the one
which joined Bristol and Thornbury.
Owing to there being no settled port of departure or arrival for vessels
employed for conveyance of Foreign Mails, the letters were frequently
despatched by privately-owned ships. They were then impressed with a
post-mark "Ship Letter," with the name of the town included.
The Penny Post letters were such as had been posted in any one of the 63
Bristol Penny Post Sub-District Offices for delivery in the district of
posting, or in any of the 62 other Offices. Thus a letter posted in
Fylton for delivery in Fylton would be charged one penny upon being
handed in at that Post Office, and another penny would be obtained on
delivery to the addressee.
A letter posted at the Penny Post Office of Almondsbury for delivery in
the Penny Post District of Fylton would be charged a penny upon being
handed in at the Almondsbury Office and another penny would be charged
to the addressee on delivery. Thornbury being a 5th Clause Post would
have letters posted in its special "Open" box, delivered in the
Thornbury Postal area for the one penny, that charged on delivery.
A letter posted in the "Open" box at Thornbury (5th Clause Post) for
Bristol would likewise travel from Poster to addressee for the 1d.
delivery charge in Bristol, as bags would be exchanged between the two
places.
A single letter, _i.e._, a letter without an enclosure, coming from
Reading for Thornbury, would be charged a general post rate of 8d. to
Bristol, plus 1d. for delivery, which would be the same in the cases
of letters from Reading for Fylton or Almondsbury; but if a letter were
posted at Thornbury for Reading, there would be no charge from Thornbury
to Bristol, so that the addressee would only be called upon to pay the
general post rate of 8d., whereas, the postage on a letter from Fylton
or Almondsbury would be 8d., plus a penny charged for collection.
[Illustration: EARLY BRISTOL POST MARKS.]
The mail services in the rural districts are not free from danger. The
pitcher may have been carried to the fountain year after year without
mishap, but it not infrequently becomes broken at last. In like manner
the contractor for the Portishead, Clevedon, and Yatton mail cart
service, after having driven over this route with immunity from accident
for forty years, yet came to grief in the last week of his connection
with His Majesty's mails, January, 1902. The contractor's time table was
arranged thus:--Portishead, leave 9.15 p.m.; Clevedon, arrive 10.5 p.m.,
leave 10.50 p.m.; Yatton, arrive 11.28 p.m.; attend to apparatus and up
mail 12.17 a.m., down mail 12.42 a.m.; Yatton, leave 1.5 a.m.; Clevedon,
arrive 1.48 a.m., depart 4.15 a.m.; Portishead, arrive 5.5 a.m.
The contractor, Mr. Dawes, now in the 66th year of his age, having
performed a part of his outward journey on the 19th September, 1902,
left Clevedon for Yatton quite sober as ever, and in his usual health.
Then comes the mystery. He did not reach Yatton in due course, and the
railway signalman intimated the failure to Bristol, from which office
the postmaster of Clevedon was advised, who at early dawn started out a
scout on a bicycle to search for the missing mailman and mail bags. The
scout discovered no signs of man or mails between Clevedon and the
Yatton apparatus station, and going back over the same ground, he
eventually met an individual who had seen an aged man with a whip in his
hand wandering on the road. This he knew to be his man, and he
discovered Dawes walking aimlessly along the road at about 7 a.m. His
explanations were not coherent. The horse had ran away with him, and
flung him off the cart into a ditch; he had tumbled off the cart, and
walked into a ditch; he had tried to knock people up to assist him in
trying to find what had become of the missing mails! In the meantime, a
farm labourer going out on to the Kingston Seymour moors to milk the
cows discovered the mail cart turned over on to its side, and thus
embedded in a rhine on the roadside. The horse also was in the rhine, up
to his back, partly in mud and partly in water. The milkman immediately
started off to Clevedon to give the alarm, and his employer, who was
accompanying him on his journey to the milking ground, took prompt
steps, in conjunction with moor men, to drag horse and vehicle out of
the mud and mire. Fortunately, the mailbags were uninjured, and the
postmaster of Clevedon, who had set out on a search, had them conveyed
back to his office. Dazed contractor Dawes, the muddy mail cart, and
horse coated with mud from head to hoofs, were got back into the town at
about 11 a.m. It would seem that the contractor fell asleep and tumbled
from his box into the road, and that his horse wandered on, grazing from
side to side of the road, till eventually in the dark of night horse and
cart fell into the rhine. On coming to himself, the contractor, after
trying in vain to arouse the inhabitants of roadside houses, wandered
about all night, or it may be laid down somewhere to await morning
light. The animal was injured to such an extent that it had to be
destroyed.
During the fierce gale which, with unparalleled severity, raged in the
Bristol Channel on the night of Thursday, the 10th September, 1903, a
vessel was driven ashore on the Gore Sands. Soon after daybreak a call
was made for the Burnham Lifeboat, but, in consequence of the heavy
seas, the crew was unable to launch her. The coxswain, therefore,
telegraphed for the Watchet Lifeboat to proceed to the rescue. Every
endeavour was made by the Postal Telegraph authorities to expeditiously
transmit the message, but the elements which had operated against the
vessel, had likewise played havoc with the telegraph wires, with the
result that the telegram sustained such delay in transmission as to
retard the launching of the Lifeboat. Fortunately, no serious
consequences followed.
As regards mail communication, the night journey by road from Bristol to
Bath and Chippenham could not be made, owing to the roads being blocked
by fallen trees.
The gale was far reaching in its effects, and carried away parts of
Weston-super-Mare Pier, landed boats on promenade, blew down walls,
chimneys, and laid low hundreds of trees, was especially "a howler," and
disastrous as regards interference with telegraphic communication. Wires
were blown down in all directions, and Bristol suffered greatly. On the
11th, at 11.0 a.m., there was no wire whatever available to South Wales,
and telegrams had to be sent by train. There was no wire available to
Scotland or to the north beyond Birmingham, or to Cork and Jersey.
Several local lines were down, such as Wedmore, Hambrook, Yatton,
Portishead, Wickwar, etc. Delay of 50 minutes occurred to Birmingham,
which office transmitted all work for the north. The delay to London was
40 minutes. Trunk telephone communication was impossible. Every wire was
interrupted, and remained so all day. In the evening there was still no
wire which could be used to Scotland, Cork, or Channel Islands. Cardiff
was reached at 3.0 p.m., on one wire.