POST OFFICE
References the other day to the probability of an early inauguration of air mail services between Hong Kong and China coast ports, including Canton, recall the early days of the Colony, when it was a matter of difficulty to arrange a mail-carriage service even to so close a place as Canton.
It may be mentioned that the penny post system had been inaugurated a year before the Colony was founded, but naturally, with sailing ships doing most of the traffic out to these parts, and long and irregular services, the facilities in Hong Kong were little more than the primitive postal-packet system. The records show that there was considerable difficulty in the Forties in arranging for the conveyance of mails to Canton and it is set down that in 1846 sixty Hong Kong merchants got together and arranged with the owners of the Corsair, an early steamship, to carry mails to the Chinese city at a rate of £150 a month. The following year, however, the H.K. Postmaster General stepped in, and insisted on this vessel carrying Post Office letters to Canton, and arranging for their being taken ashore there, at a rate of 2d. each. The captain - probably quite justifiably refused to deliver the letters, on the ground that there was no Post Office in Canton; but the Government evidently treated this as wilful opposition, for proceedings were brought in Court, and a fine of £100 was imposed. The British (mercantile) community considered themselves aggrieved by this, and they addressed a complaint to the Postmaster General in London. Later they resolved to help themselves by inaugurating their own service, founding a river steamship company (a joint stock enterprise) to ply between Hong Kong and Canton and carry their goods and mails. In this we see the beginning of the river-boat services that ply so regularly to-day.
It is intended to write a brief history of the Post Office of Hong Kong, so far as available records disclose material of a historical nature. This does not mean that the various postal conventions, postage rates, and so forth will be dealt with (though references to these will be necessary in places) but that the establishment of a postal department in the Colony, its altered status, growth, and changes of site, as well as various sidelights on staff arrangements and development of the present efficient service will be traced as far as possible.
By courtesy of the Post Office officials, it has been possible to examine the records as far back as they go to 1847, and in the course of another two or three days, it is hoped to complete this piece of research. Meanwhile, a preliminary survey might be taken of the Hong Kong Post Office - its founding, and original situation. By the kindness of the Postmaster General, I am able to-day to reproduce an old photograph in possession of his department, showing the Post Office as it appeared in 1899, situated at the corner of Queen's Road and Pedder Street, where the China building now stands.
This old building was erected, the records disclose, about 1845, and at a later stage was thoroughly repaired; even then it soon proved inadequate for its purposes. The move was made to the present building in 1911.
The records disclose that from the outset the Postmaster had living quarters in the premises, and there was a portion also housing the coolies employed by the department. These aspects of the history of the place will be dealt with in more detail subsequently.
There is very little left us of the earliest history of the Hong Kong Post Office, and even the initials of the first Postmaster are not known. The records go back only to the time a move was made to the premises in Queen's Road which are shown in the photograph published here; the earliest of the
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