The Post Office was an immensely important institution of the British state. It fostered
communication, encouraged business, provided employment and generated revenue for the
Treasury. Efficiency and economy were paramount considerations for the Post Office
authorities keen to maintain the government’s trust in good management. ...
The Post Office was an immensely important institution of the British state. It fostered
communication, encouraged business, provided employment and generated revenue for the
Treasury. Efficiency and economy were paramount considerations for the Post Office
authorities keen to maintain the government’s trust in good management. Maintaining
public trust to deliver mail and messages speedily and securely also underpinned its
operations. When trust was called into question, often by theft of mail by postal workers
themselves or by the rising costs of sick leave, the Post Office were keen to act. In this paper
we examine two critical points of tension in the Post Office that tested trust in the
institution. The first related to the incidence of mail theft by its own workers and the actions
taken by the Post Office authorities to catch and prosecute the perpetrators. The second
related to the incidence of sickness and the attempts to monitor the legitimacy of claims for
sick pay. Both instances lay bare the workings of the Post Office and the critical importance
of trust in its operations and, more widely, in late nineteenth-century urban society.