The Great Post Office Black Hole

19-02-2007

There are some things you just can't deliver by email - a rare nineteenth century book for one. But as Pete Millington discovered, sending it via Royal Mail ain't much better. Ever thought of pigeon post mate?

Two of the greatest passions in my life are literature and history, so give me a musty old second hand bookshop, a one hour lunch break and I'm a happy man

Sometimes, really old books have a value far greater than the words and sentences inside them: they are somehow special, radiating energy from the past which one absorbs on physical contact with them

So it was that I must have come across this particularly lovely old book one day, several years back, a hard backed novel with delicately thin pages and an antiquated aroma

The book was about 150 years old and contained two handwritten inscriptions, the first was dated about 1840 and was written to a young female student from her professor on graduating in literature, the second was written thirty or so years later from this same woman, now a rector's wife, to her own son as he left on his journey through life

The short inscriptions told a story as moving and inspiring as the novel itself, probably more so

Over the years the old book got lost in our house and ended up in a box in the attic with a pile of similar items that I am too sentimental to banish to a skip

Quite recently though, my wife and I agreed that if we were going to create some space in our home, or at least re-shuffle the Rubik's Cube, then some things would have to go and sentimentality would have to be put on hold

However, on closer inspection of the old book I decided to experiment with tracing the vicarage identified in the second of the inscriptions

You never know, this could be of interest to someone somewhere with an interest in their local history

Perhaps I shouldn't be too surprised in this modern age of the internet that tracing a vicarage in rural Suffolk wasn't that difficult

A quick Google search for All Saints church, Stowupland quickly threw up half a dozen links to the vicarage, the deanery and several local history websites too - there was even a list of the past vicars of the church including the man who would have been married to the lady whose actual handwriting I now had in my possession

A quick exchange of emails with the webmaster of the All Saints website proved to be very positive, a gentleman named David said that the church would be extremely interested in receiving this small item of their history

… so the following day I made a trip to the local post office, parcelled up the book, had it weighed and handed it over the counter to be sent second class to the vicarage at Stowuplands

After being away from home for over a hundred years, I didn't think there was any great rush to get it back to Suffolk, a day extra in second class wouldn't do any harm and deep down I felt confident that if the book had survived for 150 years, it would certainly make the final leg of it's journey home without further hindrance

The good old British Post Office would lovingly deliver it home to it's rightful resting place, perhaps to be put on display on a cushion in a glass box in the church having been delivered to the vicar by his cheery local post man Bert

How wrong could I be…

The weeks went by with no word of thanks from the vicar, “Ah well, a lesson in humility, I didn't do it for thank you cards from elderly people in the parish, although… an acknowledgement would have been nice…”

I posted it in November, perhaps a bit too close to the Christmas rush?

After three months, the vicar finally emailed to say “…about that book? Yes it would be lovely if you could post it over too us old chap, we'll pay the postage…God bless and all that…”

Returning to Google forthwith I quickly typed in a few words along the lines of ‘postal service', ‘lost' and ‘complaint' and was soon feeling reassured when I discovered myself guided into a very efficient looking lost post system which talked in terms of ‘tracking lost post' and even ‘compensating for lost items'

Perhaps this was all part of the field of intention emanating from the book itself, it had decided to go off on it's travels for a few more years but at least me and the current incumbent of All Saints would be able to split the compensation money

Ok….19th century antique book… yes… original inscriptions of significant historical value… blimey, we must be talking a few bob here…. Where's Arthur Negus when you need him…let me see…how long is a very old piece of frayed antique string?

Well anyway, the estimated value of the item is largely irrelevant, if it had been the Mona Lisa going second class the Postal Service would have not cared anymore than do about my lost book

The bottom line, it transpires, is that the Postal Service can't or won't do anything over the matter because I got the post code wrong

I wrote the full address for All Saints Church, Stowupland but I accidentally wrote the wrong post code down from the Deanery web page, putting the post code of the Deanery office by mistake, which happens to be in the next town (Stowmarket) and having direct jurisdiction over All Saints at Stowupland…

At this point the Postal Service put up a brick wall - it's my fault basically.

But am I wrong in believing that in days gone by people could write ‘Fred, Top of Snowdonia' on an envelope and the Post Office would find him?

I mean, how many All Saints Churches are there in Stowupland for God's sake?

And had the post office taken it to the address appertaining to the post mark, the Dean would no doubt have taken the parcel in and got a choir boy to nip up the lane on his bicycle with it

In fact, had they taken it to any address in the UK the chances are that some good soul would have got it to All Saints Church, Stowupland, Suffolk eventually… you don't need a PhD in advanced problem solving to have a wild guess at the intended destination based on that information now do you?

Had they handed it to Fred at the top of Snowdonia he'd have probably had a damned sight more of a shot at delivering it than the flaming postal service!!!!

What the heck's wrong with these people? Do human beings not work in the post office these days or are they all out to extended lunch?

What happens to letters with the wrong post code nowadays? Do they just bin them? Is there a giant bonfire somewhere at the back of Newtown main office where anything they can't be bothered to look at twice gets immediately incinerated?

If they tell me where they bung it all I'll go and look for the thing myself but I don't suppose anyone at the post office is bright enough to think of having an in-transit department

No wonder anyone with any sense is making plans to replace their reliance on snail mail with email and the internet, the sooner we find a way to make these incompetent morons obsolete, the ruddy better as far as I'm concerned

Beam me up Scotty, I'll deliver the ruddy thing myself next time!

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