Glimpses of old Glasgow

Part I. Historical

The Post-Office

WHEN I was a boy there was only one post office for the whole of Glasgow and neighbourhood - a small building in Nelson Street, and to post their letters people had to travel a distance of from two to three miles. It is not many years since sub-post offices were opened and pillar-boxes erected for the benefit of the public. When I went to learn my trade in 1832, Glasgow had only fourteen to eighteen letter-carriers. The population was then little more than 210,000. Now it is nearly 700,000, while the post office has a staff of over 1400. In those days letters were not, as now, prepaid.

In my early years the cost of sending a letter to any place outside of Glasgow was 2d., 3d., and 6d, according to distance; to Edinburgh, 7½d.; to London, 13½d.; to the West Indies, 2s. 5½d.; and to Africa, India, and Australia, a little more than to the West Indies. Now the cost to Canada, the United States, and all our British colonies is 2½d. Perhaps it will soon be only one penny.

Only a few years have passed since the parcel post system for home and abroad was inaugurated, and already it is yielding good results to traders and non-traders. Before it was started very many strongly denounced it. Now it is acknowledged to be a great advantage. Other boons enjoyed in these times are our halfpenny post-cards, postal wrappers, and our convenient perforated letter cards.

[page 143]

When the old Post Office in Nelson Street became too small for its growing business, an old building on the east side of Glassford Street, where Messrs. Wilson & Matheson's warehouse now stands, was altered and adapted for the postal service. For a number of years there had been great dissatisfaction with the Post Office arrangements. This shabby old building, standing as it did for a year or two actually without a roof, was a grievous subject of complaint. The increased postal service compelled the postal authorities to have increased accommodation, and it was decided to remove to the Manhattan Buildings, South Hanover Street, in 1856, afterwards extending to George Square. The foundation-stone of the present handsome buildings was laid by the Prince of Wales on 17th October, 1876.

The Glasgow merchants had many other grievances against the postal authorities in regard to the Post Office to complain of. The most serious of all was the unnecessary delay that for a long time took place in the transmission and delivery of English letters. The irritation became greater till at length the most patient and loyal began to speak out, and in December, 1853, a number of influential gentlemen formed themselves into a committee to take action in the matter, and memorialise the Government. The late William Walker, known under the nom de plume of "Sandy M'Alpine," was appointed secretary; and he, along with Mr. James Scott, drew up the following memorial and time-table, showing how the mails could be accelerated:-

UNTO THE RIGHT HONOURABLE VISCOUNT CANNING, HER MAJESTY'S POSTMASTER-GENERAL.

The Respectful Memorial of the undersigned Bankers, Merchants, Manufacturers, and others, carrying on business in Glasgow.

SHOWETH, - That your Lordship's Memorialists are of opinion that rapidity and punctuality in the transmission of Correspondence are of the utmost importance to every commercial community; and, in particular, that the business correspondence daily passing between Glasgow and the Commercial and Manufacturing Towns of Scotland on the one hand, and London and the Commercial and Manufacturing Towns of England on the other, is so extensive and important as to demand that special care be taken to ensure for it the most speedy transmission and the most regular delivery that is possible.

[page 144]

Your Lordship's Memorialists beg most respectfully to state further, that, for some time past, great and increasing dissatisfaction has existed throughout this Community in regard to the arrival and delivery of the English Mid-Day Mail. The letters by this Mail, as your Lordship is no doubt aware, ought to arrive at the Glasgow Post Office by twenty-five minutes past eleven A.M., and ought to be delivered by the half-past twelve Town delivery. But your Lordship's Memorialists beg most respectfully to state, that it frequently happens that the letters do not arrive at the Post-Office till after half-past twelve, in which case they are allowed to lie over till the next Town delivery at half-past three; and on such occasions, as the Letter-carriers cannot go over their districts in less than two hours, your Lordship will perceive that numbers of Letters cannot be delivered till after five o'clock. It will thus appear to your Lordship that letters posted in the afternoon or evening, say, in London, Birmingham, Liverpool, or Manchester, are frequently not delivered in this City till about twenty-four hours thereafter, while the journey from these Cities to Glasgow is daily being accomplished in 11½, 10½, and 8 hours respectively. It thus not unfrequently happens that an entire day is lost in the return correspondence from this City to the South, from the lateness of the hour at which letters are received here. Your Lordship's Memorialists feel this to be all the more vexatious, from the fact that within the last few months a Mail has been withdrawn by which these letters were delivered here by Nine a.m.

Your Lordship's Memorialists would most respectfully suggest that the commercial wants of Glasgow and of Scotland generally, can only be efficiently supplied by the despatch of an Express Mail Train from London in the evening, to arrive in Glasgow not later than half-past seven next morning, the same train to proceed as far North as Aberdeen, returning South at the latest hour that could be allowed to enable it to reach LONDON the following morning in time for the first delivery there.

Your Lordship's Memorialists would therefore beg most respectfully to call your Lordship's attention to the following Time Table for such an Express Train, which your Memorialists have constructed to meet, as far as possible, the requirements of the various important Towns touched by the line of railway by which the Mails to and from Glasgow are conveyed:-

[page 145]

Your Lordship's Memorialists would further beg respectfully to call your Lordship's attention to the insufficiency of the Glasgow Post Office itself - to the manifestly inadequate number of hands employed therein for the ordinary duties of the office - and to the frequent changes which take place among these hands, occasioned, your Lordship's Memorialists have reason to believe, by the low scale of Salaries at present paid in this Post Office. Your Lordship's Memorialists would most respectfully urge those particulars upon your Lordship's attention, as leading frequently to undue detention of letters after their arrival in the Office here, which ground of complaint would still to some extent exist, even with the best arrangement of Mail Trains.

And, in conclusion, your Lordship's Memorialists would venture to express the hope that your Lordship will be pleased, at the earliest possible date, to give effect to the reasonable requests and suggestions of this Memorial.

[page 146]

This memorial was duly forwarded to Lord Canning, then the postmaster-general, by whom it was favourably considered, and the Glasgow memorial, with its time table, was the origin of the "Limited Mail" which for the last forty years has so effectively and with so much regularity carried the daily correspondence from London and the south to Glasgow, Edinburgh, and the north. The limited mail has done great commercial service to Scotland, and for this we are indebted to Mr. William Walker.

With the telegraphs in the hands of the Government, and with the ever-increasing postal facilities and reduced rates of postage, it is no wonder that greater accommodation was necessary for the expeditious despatch of business. This has led to another extension, and on the site of the old Athenaeum in Ingram Street will be found a splendid range of buildings, nearing completion, specially built for postal purposes.