Speedy Delivery - Postal History Sunday

Welcome to the final Postal History Sunday of 2021.  If you celebrate some (or all) of the year-end holidays, I hope you are finding ways to truly appreciate and enjoy them.   If you prefer not to celebrate or if you find this time of year to be stressful, I hope you uncover ways to find balance.

But for this moment, it is Postal History Sunday time.  Push all the worries and stresses aside.  Let's put on the fluffy slippers, grab a beverage of our choice and, perhaps, learn something new!

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This week we're going to focus on the delivery of letters to their recipient.  At the present time, most of us take it for granted that our mail will be delivered to the mailbox at our residence.  Perhaps some few of us have a Post Office box where our mail is placed for us to pick it up.  Fewer of us may work for a place of business or organization that receives enough mail that someone goes to the local post office to deliver mail to be sent and pick up incoming mail.

Life in the mid 1800s was not entirely different, but home delivery was not a fact of life for many places in the world - including the United States, where delivery might cost an extra fee or may not be available at all.

Delivered to your door

During a time when delivery to the door of the intended destination was not a foregone conclusion, we can find evidence on many pieces of letter mail that give us clues that can tell us how the mail made its way to the recipient.

The most common source of evidence for determining the most likely delivery method can be found in the address panel - which is just a fancy way of saying "the area where the sender wrote the recipient's name and address."  This piece of letter mail was sent in July of 1863 from Davenport, Iowa to London, England.  The address panel reads:

    Richard Smith, Esq,  298 High Holborn, London, W.C. England G.B.

The inclusion of a full address, including a street number, on a letter during this period is an excellent indicator that it was intended to be delivered to that address.  It also helps to know that carrier services were provided in London at this time.  So, while we cannot PROVE that this was walked up to 298 High Holton and delivered, the evidence on the envelope and convention of the time at that place says it most likely was delivered by a mail carrier.

Sometimes, the address panel fails to provide us with an indication that it might have been delivered by a carrier.

Our second item is a folded business letter that is dated June 18, 1861, mailed from Brescia in Lombardy, Italy to Mantova, which was also in Lombardy - but Mantova was politically a part of Venetia at this moment in time.  So, the 20 centesimi stamp was not adequate to pay the entire postage, and an additional five soldi were required from the recipient.  The story is good enough that it is explained a bit further in a Postal History Sunday from August of this year.

This time around, we are actually more interested in the back of this folded letter because it tells us a bit about the delivery.

 There are two markings on the back. One is the Mantova, June 19 receiving mark.  The other reads "Distribuzione 1," which indicates that this went out with the first delivery of the mail for the day.  

Yes, you read that correctly.  Some cities provided multiple deliveries over the course of a day, and Mantova was among the Italian cities that often placed a backstamp on the letters to indicate which of those deliveries a letter was taken out on.

To drive that point home, here is the reverse of another folded business letter that was sent to Torino (Turin) in 1863.  The marking at the top right reads "4A Dist," which means it was sent out during the 4th distribution of the mail.  The oval marking at the bottom left with the number "56" indicated which carrier was responsible for the delivery.

Put in your post office box

During the 1860s, it was fairly common for letters to be delivered by a carrier in Europe, but less common in the United States.  This is not so hard to understand when you consider the fact that most cities and towns in Europe have been established far longer than most settlements in the United States.  For example, the letter below was a "local" letter sent from (and to) Waterloo, Iowa.

The white settlement in this area was originally known as Prairie Rapids Crossing, which was established in 1845.  Nearby were two Mesqwaki seasonal camps situated by the Cedar River.  Clearly, Waterloo was a very young settlement and it should not be a surprise that a carrier service had not been established for the town after only 20 or so years of occupation by people who put a high priority on US mail services.

As far as the Mesqwaki are concerned, 1845 is the point in time when they were "removed" from Iowa to Kansas.  So, if you were wondering how it was so easy for the white settlement of Waterloo to develop quickly without too much friction from those who already lived there - you have your answer.

This letter was likely mailed in 1866 or 1867 and qualified for a rate which is commonly referenced as a "drop letter."  After May 1, 1865, a special one-cent rate applied for letters that were dropped off at the post office and did not require any additional carriage by the postal service to another post office.  The addition qualification was that the post office in question could NOT have carrier delivery services.

In fact, the addressee for this letter apparently had a box in the post office - box 47.  And the sender of this letter was aware of it and included it on the address panel towards the bottom.  But, sometimes the box was not known by the person(s) sending a letter, but the clerk at the receiving post office knew about the box.

Shown above is an 1869 folded business letter sent from St Loubes, France to San Francisco, California.  There are two 40 centime stamps paying the proper rate for a letter weighing no more than 7.5 grams and "PD" in a box at the bottom confirms that the postage had been paid.

Apparently, there are many letters in collector's hands from this correspondence and they all have this number placed in pencil on the front.  Sometimes the pencil marking is pretty obtrusive - and sometimes it appears to have been erased (but evidence can still be seen of the number "1077").  Dick Winter reports in his book on Trans-Atlantic mail that this is likely a post office box number for the recipient [1].  I see no reason to contradict that conclusion and suspect Mr. Winter has seen far more items from this correspondence and others like it to San Francisco than I ever will.

This is just a reminder to us all that sometimes a person just needs to have enough experience and see enough examples to reach a reasonably well informed conclusion.  It's also a good reminder that we all owe a debt to others who share knowledge - making it possible for things like Postal History Sunday to happen!

Held at the Post Office

There was also the option of sending an item to a town or city post office for what was known as "General Delivery" in the United States.

Above is a letter from Brooklyn, New York to Puerto Rico in 1935.  There is ten cents in postage to pay the 10 cent air mail rate that was in effect at that time.  The initial address was to an individual who must have been arriving in Puerto Rico by ship - but there was a chance that the letter would arrive too late to catch Rosemary Rabus at that location.  So, a forwarding address was included on the envelope that suggested she would pick up her mail at the General Delivery window in the Juana Diaz post office.

Anyone could come to the post office to check if they had mail to be picked up via General Delivery, but there was always a danger that a person would not necessarily know to go there.  In this case, it seems that the sender and the recipient (likely related) were both aware of the plan.

The equivalent service in Europe during the 1860s would have been sending an item and marking it as "Poste Restante."   

The letter shown above was mailed from Canandaigua, New York to Paris, France in 1863.  The letter weighed more than a quarter ounce and no more than a half ounce, so it required 30 cents in postage to get to its destination.

If you look at the bottom of the address, we see the words "Poste Restante" which instructed the postmaster in Paris to hold on to the letter until Charles A Loomis came to pick up his mail.  However, it might seem odd because we actually see a street address on this letter too.  When we see "Rue du Dauphin 3" we might be tempted to conclude this was a carrier delivery in Paris (they certainly did have carrier delivery there at this time).

Section of 1863 Henriot pocket map

If you click on this portion of an 1863 Paris map, you will find that Rue du Dauphin is not very long and ends at the Seine River.

The question for us now is to decide what to believe.  The street address or the instructions for the letter to stay at the post office to be picked up.  The solution is most likely that the letter was left at the post office in response to the "Poste Restante" instructions.  However, Paris was (and is) so large that there was more than one post office that could have held the letter for the recipient.  The address gave the postal service an opportunity to determine which of these offices should take on the duty of holding the mail for the recipient to pick it up.

Delivered to a commercial agent

Another option that was used frequently by those who were traveling was to arrange to have mail sent to your financial or other business agent.  This entity would then provide the service of either holding your mail until you picked it up or forwarding your mail on to your next scheduled location on your itinerary.

Above is a letter sent from Boston, Massachusetts in 1862 to London, England.  If you read the address panel, the item was sent "Care Mess. Geo. Peabody & Co."  Once again, we have a letter that is part of a known correspondence, so we can see a pattern by looking at different examples to the same person.  Hudson liked to put dockets on his envelopes that showed when he received a letter and when he responded to that letter.  The rapidity of his responses tell us he either dropped by the offices of George Peabody & Co daily, or he had arranged for them to have someone bring the mail to him from those offices.  We'll likely never know for certain which it is - but that's ok.  A little mystery never hurt anyone.

The use of financial institutions that were providing travelers with monetary exchange and credit services as mail forwarding or holding service is not limited to the 1800s.  As we can see above, the American Express Company was in operation and forwarding the mail in 1911.

Delivered to a government agent

In some cases, a person could also send letters care of their country's consulate or delegation in the destination country.  The letter shown below is actually discussed in more detail in this June Postal History Sunday.  

The focus on this 1863 letter from New Brighton, Pennsylvania to Florence, Italy, is actually on the fancy marking that can be found on the back of the envelope.

Apparently, Isaac Eugene Craig could expect to pick up his mail in Florence by going to the US Consulate General.  At that time, as it is today, there were US Consulates in more than one Italian city.  Not every office struck incoming mail with something quite as fancy as this.  In fact, many added nothing additional to the envelope.  As the modern website for this US Consulate states, you can't expect all of the same services from one consulate to the next.

"Peace" by I.E. Craig circa 1878

Craig was a painter from the United States who was working in Florence, as evidenced by some of his paintings.  This biography places Craig in New Brighton in 1861 and suggests he was in Florence later in the 1860s.  It does not seem far fetched that he had personal connections with someone who remained behind in New Brighton when he took a trip to Florence in 1863.  As to why the US Consulate was the recipient of choice - we can only speculate.

And, if a person wanted to match up the oil painting by this artist with a piece of postal history, it seems you only needed $6900 to do it in 2010.   Um.  Ok.  I'll stick with the postal history, thank you!

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There you have it!  Another Postal History Sunday and perhaps a few things that you might have learned that are new to you.  Thank you once again for joining me and I hope you have a great remainder of your day and an excellent week to come.

[1] Winter, Dick, Understanding Trans-Atlantic Mail, Vol 1, American Philatelic Society, 2006.