 History of the Driffield Post Office |
DRIFFIELD AND WOLDS GENEALOGY |
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HISTORY OF THE DRIFFIELD POST OFFICE By J. BROWNE, BRIDLINGTON QUAY (written 1880’s) The jubilee of the penny postage on the 10th instance, seems to present a fitting occasion for giving a brief sketch of the introduction and progress of the postal system in Driffield. It is curious an interesting, and forms an important chapter in the commercial and social history of the town and may prove welcome to those who like to enquire into the state of things in the past. I believe that I am the only person now living who is able to furnish the information, which I am about to give. It has during a long course of years been gleaned from documents and conversations with very old persons, long since dead, and if not now published, it may be forever lost to future generations. One hundred and eighteen years ago Driffield was without the privilege of a post office. Previous to 1772, the postal route of the town was of the circuitous, tardy, and irregular character. All letters and parcels went by way of Hull, through Beverley to York and from that place across the Wolds to Kilham, then a market town. From Kiham there was no regular post and letters for Driffield were brought once a fortnight by an old woman on an ass and subsequently by an old man named Gardner, who used to drive to Scarborough with a Galloway and cart, and another old man with a similar conveyance took letters to Beverley, and Gardner waited his return. The enclosure of the open fields in the lordship of Driffield, in 1742 and the opening of the navigable canal to Hull in 1767 gave a great impetus to develop the social and commercial progress of the town. Strangers from neighbouring towns were attracted to it and it became a rising place. Corn factors, coal and timber merchants, and other branches of trade sprung up and the population increased annually at the rate of 140%. Lawyers and doctors also flocked in. The first two solicitors who settled in town were William Conyers (grandfather to the late E.D. Conyers) and Thomas Cator, both from Malton. Previous to this the legal business of the inhabitants was done by solicitors at Malton, Beverley and Bridlington, but chiefly by lawyer Prickett, of Kilham, and his son, afterwards of Bridlington. He used to attend once a week on horseback with his saddlebags, filled with parchments and papers, and his horses’ trappings were of white untanned leather. The three doctors who were settled in the town were Doctor Cowart, who resided in a house upon the site of which the house occupied by Mr Lovel, butcher, now stands, and whose wife was the only lady who attended church in a silk gown; Doctor Johnson, who resided in Doctor’s lane, which obtained its named from his residing in it; and Doctor Dobson, who resided in a house forming part of Mr Robinson’s grocer’s shop. Manufactories and mills also came into existence in the town, and the ancient markets which had been dormant for a long time were rapidly reviving. This progressive and active state of affairs demanded improved facilities. Application was made to the postal authorities for more speedy and direct postal accommodation. The postal regulations at that time required that the annual postage should amount to £40, or a guarantee be given to make up any deficiency in that sum. To obviate this difficulty, Mr Henry Drinkrow, the younger, gentleman, entered into a bond with the Post Master General. In this bond it is stated that Driffield was then a good market town, and the business carried on was daily increasing, but was greatly cramped and delayed for want of a post by way of Beverley and Hull, to which towns there was a good turnpike road; and that if this were directed to be done letters be returned the same day and forwarded to the north and south. This request was not fully complied with, and Driffield letters were continued to be sent from the south round by York, but were brought from Malton three times a week, arriving in Driffield at 8 o’clock on the morning of Monday, Thursday and Saturday, and returning at two o’clock on the afternoons of Monday, Thursday and Sundays. With the increasing trade and population this three days a week post was still very defective and unsatisfactory and towards the latter part of the last century another application was for a daily post, which through the efforts of the merchants and traders, assisted by the late Sir Christopher Sykes, Bart., proved successful and the event was celebrated by a dinner at the Blue Bell Inn, to which Sir Christopher was invited and honoured with his presence. It seems strange that two at least of the more prominent personages in the town unconnected with commercial affairs opposed, or stood aloof from this important movement, for a skittish paper was published ridiculing the dinner party and sneeringly remarking that two of the principal families – the Grays and the Drinkrows – did not join Sir Christopher and “Barber Bannister.” In all matters of its early progress the town was indebted to the intelligence and enterprise of the Porter family, especially in these postal improvements, as well as being the prime movers in the cutting of the canal. The letters, however, were still sent round by York, and were brought from Malton to Driffield by a man on horseback named Robert Linsley, alias “Postman Bob,” who was succeeded by his son, Thomas, known as “Post Tom.” Another riding postman met “Bob” at Sledmere and took the letters across the Wolds to Bridlington. In 1827, it was proposed by the Postal Authorities to establish a mail from Hull by way of Bridlington to Scarborough and other places in the North. Driffield, however, was not included in the route and a meeting was held at the Blue Bell Inn to petition the Postmaster general, that the proposed mail should pass through the town and that in the meantime a mail cart might run from Hull, through Driffield, to Bridlington. This latter request was conceded, and a mail cart left every morning for Hull and returned at seven in evening; and the letters for Bridlington and Scarborough were sent forward by another mail cart, driven by William Moody, to Scarborough. This drive – a distance of 32 miles – was performed after sunset and before sunrise. The road between Bridlington and Scarborough was hilly, then partly unenclosed, extremely lonely on a dark night, and in some parts close to the sea cliffs, affording easy facilities for plundering the mail bags, which frequently contained large sums of money. On the night of the 20th December, 1833, a daring attempt was made about three miles from Scarborough to rob the mail bags and murder the driver of the mail cart. Shortly after this the inhabitants of Driffield, Bridlington and Scarborough petitioned the Postmaster general to run a mail coach from Hull through Driffield and Bridlington, to Scarborough. In compliance with the above petition a Royal Mail Coach, with four horses, and a guard and driver gaily apparelled with crimson and gold lace, passed through the town for the first time on Sunday the 31st July 1834, about five o’clock in the afternoon, and attracted a large number of spectators. The Royal Mail continued to run until the 1st March, 1847, when the North Eastern Railway Company contracted to convey the mails, which arrived from Hull every morning at 57 minutes past 8, instead of 5 in the afternoon. The despatches have since been accelerated at different times until they have reached the present postal deliveries. How favourably the present facilities for travelling and despatching letters contrasts with those at the latter part of the last century and the earliest part of the present. Instead of receiving our letters once a fortnight, then once a week, and next three times a week, we now receive them three times a day! Who would change the present for the past – “the good old times when George the Third was King?” And we owe all this to the greatest boon that has ever been bestowed upon our social system – the Railway! The first post-office was in a long, old thatched house on the west side of the Market place extending from the corner of the London Inn, nearly up to the shop occupied by Mr Michael Temple, the site of which was then an open piece of vacant ground on which, mountebanks used to perform. The first post-master was Mr Etherington, who continued such for 50 years. In 1799 the property on the west side of the Market place was sold by Mr Langley, the Lord of the Manor. The old thatched house was pulled down, the Market place was widened, and the post office, I believe, was removed to an old shop on the site of which now stands Messrs Pickerings’ ironmongers shop, and remained there until about 1822, when Mr Etherington died or resigned. Mr Etherington was the first printer in the town and sold drugs and stationery and kept a circulating library. The late Mr Edward Creaser, druggist, was apprenticed to him in 1803 and he worked at the press as well. He used to relate that during the great contested Yorkshire Elections in 1807, when Milton, Lascelles and Wiberforce were the candidates, there was so much printing work to be done that he never had his clothes off during the whole fortnight that it lasted, working day and night. The next postmaster was Mr Christopher Laybourne, the ingenious mechanic, self-taught watch and clock maker, musician, printer, and parish clerk. He held the office until his death in 1831. The business of the office was continued in the family until his daughter, Miss Catherine Laybourne, ultimately became the postmistress. On Mr Laybourne becoming the post master the office was removed to his residence, which was either the identical spot where the present office is, or not far from it. After his death it was taken across the street to an old house since pulled down and upon the site of which part of Mr Ezard’s watchmaker’s shop was erected. The office was shortly removed to the shop in New Road, in which the Misses Miller, Berlin wool dealers lately resided. Lieutenant Domanski, a wandering Polish refugee, whose career partakes somewhat of the romantic, having married Miss Catherine Laybourne, about 1847, he obtained the appointment of post master, which he continued to hold for a few years, when he mysteriously disappeared, and died some years ago in America. As he was a Driffield “character” I may some day give a sketch of him. Mr Frederick Dobson, jeweller and watchmaker, obtained the next appointment and he opened the office in a workroom adjoining his shop in the Market place, which singularly enough brought the office back to the old place where it was first opened. After being postmaster some years, he suddenly died and the next appointment was conferred upon Mr R Welburn, who had for some time been Mr Dobson’s assistant in the office. The business was carried on by Mr Welburn in the same place, but the apartment was so inconvenient and unhealthy that the office was removed to its present situation, which as already stated is either the same place where the business was carried on when Mr Laybourne was postmaster, or not very far from it. After a time Mr Welburn resigned and Mr F Benbew, the present postmaster succeeded him. Having given a brief account of the post office and the postmasters as far as I am able, I will try to relate a few reminiscences of some of the letter carriers. The fist of whom I possess any information was John Robson, whom I well remember. Besides being the letter carrier, he was a cobbler, poorhouse master and bill poster. John entered on his duties about 1810 and continued until 1848, when he retired. After his long service of 38 years, John, who was then in his 76th year, considered that he was entitled to a retiring pension and I drew up a memorial to the postmaster general, stating his long services and small pay and forwarded this for him, but I believe John’s petition was not successful. Amongst his multifarious duties John, with the assistance of his “home secretary” was clever at accommodating young ladies who wanted valentines. Many a young lady languishing for a valentine and anticipating the “postman’s knock,” would eagerly ask John if he had got a valentine for her. He would say, “Not this morning – there’ll mebby be one for you tomorrow,” and, “sure as the clock,” there was one ready made for her, but the missive not having passed through the post office, the postage (penny ha’penny), passed into his pocket for his own special use and benefit. From his industry and economy John was able to save as much money as enabled him to build two houses in Mill street. Uncharitable people christened one of them “Valentine house,” and the other they called “Pinch-belly Hall,” in allusions to his having been Master of the Workhouse. During a short interregnum James Brigham, shoemaker, was the postmaster. After Lieutenant Domanski had been postmaster for some time, he, on the score of economy, became his own letter carrier. When he had to knock at doors where there was no rapper, he found the wood too hard for his gentlemanly knuckles, so he got a little wooden mallet made, with which to give the necessary rat-tat-tat. When he had any letters for the police station he always went to the front door. Mrs Haigh, the jolly dame of the Superintendent, was not very well suited in having to unbar the main entrance. One morning she said to the Lieutenant, “I wish you would come to the back door with the letter.” “The back door!” contemptuously repeated the loyal Lieutenant, and assuming an air of offended dignity, emphatically exclaimed, “Her Majesty’s Mail knows no back door!” After the flight of Domanski, a little cockney, spectacled man, with an impediment in his speech, named John Kent, was sent down from London to fill the vacant office of letter carrier. He had been intended for a Baptist minister, but he did not fit. His friends had applied to the Postal authorities for employment for him, and he was delegated to the important office of Driffield postman. If he was unfitted for a Baptist minister, he was equally less fitted to deliver letters in a strange town, and at first he experienced considerable difficulty in finding out the residences of the inhabitants; as a natural consequence he made many mistakes. Very often too, other matters would be floating on his brain, and when he entered office, or other place of business, instead of carefully scanning the addresses of the letters, he would be looking over the top of his spectacles and stammering out passages from Milten or Shakespeare, or relate what a capital article there was in “Macmillan,” his favourite periodical. Poor “Trotty Vick,” as he was nicknamed, was a harmless and inoffensive little fellow, and his mistakes, though often annoying, were generously overlooked. After a time he married his “ladye love” from London, but whilst on a visit to the metropolis she suddenly died. For some time after he lived in his loneliness on a superannuated pension from the post office, and then gave up the ghost. “Trotty Vick” was succeeded by Biggins and Merkin, the present postmen. It would be interesting to know how the business of the post office here has increased since its establishment in 1772, but more especially so during the period of the penny postage; and how many letters, postcards, newspapers and parcels pass through it in a week. What a contrast would be presented to the number of missives passing through the office during a week prior to 1840! We are more fortunate, however, in knowing the enormous postal system of the United Kingdom. The postmaster general, the other day, stated that the actual volume of letters now carried is twenty times greater than it was fifty years ago and that taking all the missives carried, the total had risen from fifteen hundred millions to twenty three hundred millions, and that there are now eighteen thousand post offices, twenty thousand other receptacles, fifty thousand establishment officers, and fifty thousand other employees. A little more than half a century ago we could not receive a letter from London for less than 11d and an increased charge in proportion to the distance, the lowest postage – except within towns – being 4d within 15 miles. If a letter contained the least enclosure, double and treble postage was imposed. This fell peculiarly hard upon those whom in those days could ill afford to pay for a letter even once in a year; and to persons in extensive business the amount paid yearly amounted to large sums. Letters were sent by private hands, by carriers and other means. We can now transmit our thoughts and aspirations to any part of the United Kingdom for a penny – ah, for even a halfpenny by post card. What facilities it affords for the convenience of trade! What a comfort to parents and children to frequently hear from each other – to friends at a distance to reciprocate their sentiments, and to languishing lovers to solace each other by the outpourings of their mutual attachment! We only want another step forward, and that is “Ocean penny postage,” to all parts of the civilised world. And how we ought to venerate the man who was the chief medium of our obtaining this great boon, and bless the name of Rowland Hill.
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