Mail by Rail

Right from the earliest days of the Liverpool and Manchester railway, the railways played an important role in carrying the mails. In Mail By Rail, Peter Johnson tells the story of two different ways the Post Office used railways to speed up the delivery of mail.

The first part of the book covers the travelling post office (TPO), the trains that didn't just carry mail but sorted it en-route and even collected and deposited sacks of mail while travelling at express speeds. This allowed mail deliveries to be speeded up so letters posted one afternoon could be delivered at the far end of the country the next morning. The TPO became famous through the 1936 promotional film and poem "The Night Mail", the Great Train Robbery of 1963, and the Hornby working TPO coach that added fun to many a train set. The book tells the story from the earliest mail sorting in a converted horse box, the development of the exchange equipment, to the network of TPOs that once covered the country, and to the end of TPOs as services transitioned to simply carrying sorted mail. It even lists the accidents involving TPOs. For the real enthusiast or historian, the TPO services are detailed and carriages listed, including for the many pre-grouping companies which ran TPO services. 

The second part of the book covers a less well known mail railway service, the private narrow gauge underground railway linking sorting centres and railway stations across North London. This was built to get around (or rather under) the London traffic - some things never change! This hidden automated railway known as "Mail Rail" operated for 80 years, carrying mail bags but not people, but now can now be visited and ridden, which is something I must get around to. 

The appendices include more detailed information about the Mail Rail system, including technical details and the rolling stock. I can't see it being an attractive model subject, but I found it fascinating. 

The book has an unusual subject - well, two unusual subjects that are linked - but it is an interesting area of history, since neither TPOs nor Mail Rail are in operation today. No doubt part of the appeal is that their operations were largely hidden from public view, occurring in the dead of night or deep underground, yet they provided a very ordinary public service.