transformation. Further, they had helped bring it about: in 1840, the postage stamp was not just an attractive and intricate piece of paper, it was also a symbol of the popular will.
Before the Penny Post, the postal system was reliable but complex and costly; after it, letters arrived not only faster and more cheaply, but in vastly increased numbers. In 1839, one year before reform, the number of letters carried in the UK was 75,907,572. In 1840 the number more than doubled to 168,768,344. Ten years later the number was 347,069,071. How was this done? With foresight and zeal.
In the early nineteenth century it cost 4d to send a light letter from one end of London to another. The same letter would cost 8d from London to Brighton, 10d to Nottingham and at least is to Scotland. The prices had been raised frequently to pay for the Napoleonic wars, and varied according to whether they were carried by mail coach or coastal steamer. The Post Office was well organised and managed all but the final yard of the delivery with efficiency. But then there was a problem, as postage was usually paid by the recipient, a slow enough process even if the recipient was available when the postman called; it was like paying a utility bill every day. As a revenue-raising scheme it was first class; as a democratic form of communication it was fraught with difficulty and corruption. Members of Parliament had long resisted reform because the system suited them well: they received free postage on signature, and they accepted paid seats on company boards in return for signing everything that left the company's offices.
As disquiet about these inequities grew, the outgoing Secretary of the Post Office, Sir Francis Freeling, began to feel cornered. In a private note he wrote, 'Cheap postageâwhat is this men are talking about? Can it be that all my life I have been in error?' He complained that throughout his career he had run the most efficient service possible, and carried out his duties to the letter. 'Where else in the world does the merchant or manufacturer have the materials of his trade carried for him gratuitously or at so low a rate as to leave no margin of profit?'
This would not have brought much sympathy from Robert Wallace, MP for Greenock, elected through the extension of the franchise in the 1832 Parliamentary Reform Act, and a fierce opponent of the current postal service. Where Freeling saw efficiency, Wallace saw mismanagement and delay. His speeches came to the attention of a civil servant named Rowland Hill. With Wallace's assistance Hill conducted his own research into the postal system, and he published his proposal for improvement in that most Victorian of campaigning methodsâthe pamphlet. Hill noted the abnormalities and corruptions, and showed that revenue from postage had been gradually falling in recent years despite the huge potential profits to be made.
His suggestions were revolutionary. He proposed a uniform postal charge of one penny per half-ounce for any letter sent within the British Isles, and submitted that the cost should be paid in advance. To this end he drew on a previous idea of Charles Knight for a prepaid letter envelope, but his second idea was the one we remember him for: 'A bit of paper just large enough to bear the stamp, and covered at the back with a glutinous wash which the user might, by applying a little moisture, attach to the back of the letter.' Hill's 'stamp' was reference to the proof-of-postage design that had yet to be decided upon; the whole sticky square was known initially as a 'label'.
Scholars and pedants like to argue that others also have a claim on the invention of the stampâthere is a Lieutenant Treffenberg of Sweden (1823), James Chalmers, a bookseller from Dundee (1834), and Laurenz Kosir from Austria (1836). Their claims are well founded but almost irrelevant. It is never difficult, after the event, to claim that you were the one who had the idea for 'Eleanor Rigby'
Before the Penny Post, the postal system was reliable but complex and costly; after it, letters arrived not only faster and more cheaply, but in vastly increased numbers. In 1839, one year before reform, the number of letters carried in the UK was 75,907,572. In 1840 the number more than doubled to 168,768,344. Ten years later the number was 347,069,071. How was this done? With foresight and zeal.
In the early nineteenth century it cost 4d to send a light letter from one end of London to another. The same letter would cost 8d from London to Brighton, 10d to Nottingham and at least is to Scotland. The prices had been raised frequently to pay for the Napoleonic wars, and varied according to whether they were carried by mail coach or coastal steamer. The Post Office was well organised and managed all but the final yard of the delivery with efficiency. But then there was a problem, as postage was usually paid by the recipient, a slow enough process even if the recipient was available when the postman called; it was like paying a utility bill every day. As a revenue-raising scheme it was first class; as a democratic form of communication it was fraught with difficulty and corruption. Members of Parliament had long resisted reform because the system suited them well: they received free postage on signature, and they accepted paid seats on company boards in return for signing everything that left the company's offices.
As disquiet about these inequities grew, the outgoing Secretary of the Post Office, Sir Francis Freeling, began to feel cornered. In a private note he wrote, 'Cheap postageâwhat is this men are talking about? Can it be that all my life I have been in error?' He complained that throughout his career he had run the most efficient service possible, and carried out his duties to the letter. 'Where else in the world does the merchant or manufacturer have the materials of his trade carried for him gratuitously or at so low a rate as to leave no margin of profit?'
This would not have brought much sympathy from Robert Wallace, MP for Greenock, elected through the extension of the franchise in the 1832 Parliamentary Reform Act, and a fierce opponent of the current postal service. Where Freeling saw efficiency, Wallace saw mismanagement and delay. His speeches came to the attention of a civil servant named Rowland Hill. With Wallace's assistance Hill conducted his own research into the postal system, and he published his proposal for improvement in that most Victorian of campaigning methodsâthe pamphlet. Hill noted the abnormalities and corruptions, and showed that revenue from postage had been gradually falling in recent years despite the huge potential profits to be made.
His suggestions were revolutionary. He proposed a uniform postal charge of one penny per half-ounce for any letter sent within the British Isles, and submitted that the cost should be paid in advance. To this end he drew on a previous idea of Charles Knight for a prepaid letter envelope, but his second idea was the one we remember him for: 'A bit of paper just large enough to bear the stamp, and covered at the back with a glutinous wash which the user might, by applying a little moisture, attach to the back of the letter.' Hill's 'stamp' was reference to the proof-of-postage design that had yet to be decided upon; the whole sticky square was known initially as a 'label'.
Scholars and pedants like to argue that others also have a claim on the invention of the stampâthere is a Lieutenant Treffenberg of Sweden (1823), James Chalmers, a bookseller from Dundee (1834), and Laurenz Kosir from Austria (1836). Their claims are well founded but almost irrelevant. It is never difficult, after the event, to claim that you were the one who had the idea for 'Eleanor Rigby'
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