Local history: The stamp of approval for Mayo’s postal service

By Tom Gillespie

FROM the mid-17th century, the postal service routes of the Royal Mail radiated out from Dublin. However, it would be more than a century before they came in any comprehensive way to Co. Mayo.

Among the earliest post offices opened in the county were those at Killala, Newport and Castlebar. Rathlacken, Dugort, Westport, Kilkelly and Ballyhaunis post offices were opened before 1845.

In the early years of the postal service, according to ‘The Story of Mayo’ by Rosa Meehan and published by Mayo County Council in 2003, mail was delivered to post offices by foot or horse, mail-cart or stagecoach; in the days before rural postal deliveries began, recipients would visit their local post office to collect any mail awaiting them.

The Postmaster-General had a responsibility to survey and map roads used by the mail coaches and to suggest improvements to the Grand Juries, who were responsible for the roads until the introduction of the County Council system in 1898. When the railways came to Mayo, they became an important means of transporting the mail.

W.H. Maxwell, author of ‘Wild Sports of the West’, first published in 1832, stayed for some time at Croy Lodge, Ballycroy, on the Erris Peninsula. According to Maxwell, his foot-postman followed a rugged horse-path through the hills to Ballycroy which, although seldom used in his time, was in the 1780s the only means of communication between Erris and the southern baronies.

By the mid-19th century, the Royal Mail post service was available throughout Ireland. It offered a more affordable service to the general public, requiring payment from the sender of the letter rather than from the recipient, as was previously the system.

Post offices began to offer many services besides the delivering and sending of mail. They became centres of activity for all levels of society in towns and villages throughout the country, presenting opportunities for people to socialise on a regular basis.

From 1861, the Post Office Savings Bank was introduced to post offices everywhere and became increasingly popular.

The old age pension was introduced in 1908 and was paid through the post offices. Then, from 1912, post offices took over responsibility for the telegraph and telephone services. From the 1950s, telephone kiosks were installed outside post offices throughout the country, providing for the first time public telephones in many areas.

Mail continued to be delivered by foot or horse, mail-car or stagecoach until the early 20th century.

Charles R. Browne, who undertook an ethnographic study of the Erris Peninsula, photographed a mail-car changing horses at Bangor Erris in 1885 (pictured). The driver is seen covering the goods on the back of the car, while a tired horse is being led away, to be replaced by fresh horses.

Fresh teams were introduced at designated stops along all postal routes, as well as at coaching inns in the larger towns, such as Daly’s Hotel (Imperial) in Castlebar and the Courthouse in Balla, both probably former coach houses. Unlike mail-cars, stagecoaches were covered cars and doubled as passenger transport, capable of carrying up to 20 people inside and outside the car. The early mail stagecoaches were protected by detachments, armed with blunderbusses.

John Howard Pentland, Senior Surveyor and later one of the three Principal Surveyors of the Architectural Department of the Board of Works, is credited with designing the post offices in Westport and Castlebar at the end of the 19th century, when many larger towns began to provide purpose-built post offices.

The well-proportioned arcade of Westport Post Office reveals Pentland’s love of classical architecture. The three semi-circular arches in the front of the post office building are in the tradition of the arched market houses along the Mall in Westport, but are far larger in size.

A distinguishing feature of old Castlebar Post Office on Ellison Street is the large, ornate wrought-iron scrolls that hold up the gutters. The design of the building compensates for the slope on which it was built and the horizontal laying of red bricked grey stonework gives an attractive liveliness to the post office.

From the early 20th century, the postman on his bicycle was a familiar and welcome sight throughout Mayo. Doing his job in all kinds of weather, he provided a significant social service by bringing news to isolated villages and farmsteads.

J.M. Synge (1871 to 1909), travelling through Erris in 1905, reported his experiences in a series of articles in the Manchester Guardian and The Shanachie; they were later published in his 1911 book called ‘In Wicklow, West Kerry and Connemara’.

He wrote that ‘one could see white roads in the distance – often relief roads – twisting among the hills, with no one on them but a man here and there riding with his mails from some forgone village’.

From the 1960s and ‘70s postal workers on bicycles began to be replaced by drivers in mail vans.

This led to an initial reduction in the number of staff employed since it was said that one motorised postal worker could perform the work of 25 non-motorised workers.