PLYMOUTH |
The Encyclopaedia of Plymouth History |
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NAVY POST OFFICE (1795-1834)
1795 In March 1795 Mrs Rivers wrote to the GPO in London complaining about the difficulty of hiring watermen to deliver the letters to ships moored in the Sound or the Cattewater. The senior Naval Officer, Admiral Parker, insisted that the Post Office should keep its own boat and crew for that purpose. The Surveyor was sent to investigate and he reported on March 20th 1795 that: ‘Two persons of some respectability living at a place called Barbican have engaged to take the ships letters every morning and deliver them on board ships in the Sound, Catwater and Cawsand Bay, provided they receive 1d on each letter delivered and collected’. He also noted that these contractors would charge extra on “express letters” at the rate of a half-guinea (10s 6d) when a four-oared boat was required; and one guinea (£1 1s) for a n eight-oared one. The contract was approved and apparently implemented immediately. It is considered that this was the establishment of the Navy Post Office. [1] 1809 It was revealed in 1820 that the first Receiver of the Mails for the ships in Plymouth Sound had been one Mr Benjamin Hart, of the Crown and Anchor Hotel. In around 1809 he moved to the Navy Tavern, which may well have been newly built, and took the Mail with him and where he remained until 1812. [1] 1812 In 1812 there were two Post Offices in existence in the Town, the Navy Post Office, run by Benjamin Hart, and the Plymouth Post Office, where Mrs Rivers in charge. [1] Mr Hart gave up the Navy Hotel, and thereby the Navy Post Office, in 1812 when Mr John Driscoll took over. His good fortune did not last long because later that same year an order was issued that all letters for the “King’s Ships” should be sent to the Plymouth Dock Post Office. During the Napoleonic War the revenue from Mail for merchant vessels moored around the Port must have sustained it as in 1820 it was still open. In that year Mr Driscoll was about to move to a different public house and wanted to take the mail contract with him. But Mr Woollcombe, acting on behalf of the Sutton Pool Company, wished it to remain at the Navy Tavern. [1] 1826 The Navy Post Office remained at the Navy Tavern until 1826 when it was closed down upon advice from Mr Markes, the chief clerk at the Plymouth Post Office. He presumably felt that the revenue should go direct to the Plymouth Office. [1] 1827 As previously stated the Navy Post Office apparently closed down in 1826. The following year Mr John Pile, the new tenant and licensee of the Navy Hotel, applied to have the Office re-opened with himself as the Receiver. The Post Office’s Surveyor was once more despatched to investigate and reported back that although the Office should be re-opened it should be in the hands of Mr John Driscoll, as before. He was by now the landlord of the Royal Oak, not far from the original Navy Hotel, so the Navy Post Office was re-opened there. [1] 1833 It will have been noted already the influence exercised by Mr Charles Markes, the chief clerk and erstwhile Postmaster of the Plymouth Post Office over affairs in the Town. He was no doubt also responsible for the local Member of Parliament, Mr Collier, writing in 1833 to the Postmaster-General to request the closure of the Navy Post Office on the grounds that it was both unnecessary and inconveniently situated. The Surveyor discovered that the case for its retention was purely for the benefit of one local shipping company, which had just engaged Mr Driscoll junior as shipping clerk. [1] The Postmaster-General ruled that in future only letters actually addressed ‘care of the Navy Post Office’ should be forwarded there and that all other letters must remain at the Plymouth Post Office for collection by the respective ships’ officers. [1] 1834 The saga of the Navy Post Office had not quite gone away. In 1834 the Port of Plymouth Chamber of Commerce asked for three Town sub-offices to be set up, in which they included the Navy Post Office. Two were agreed but not the one on the Navy Post Office. As a result its business dropped off considerably and it was closed for good. [1] Sources:
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