The General Post Office in St. Martin's Le Grand (later known as GPO East) was the main post office for London between 1829 and 1910, the headquarters of the

General Post Office The General Post Office (GPO) was the state postal system and telecommunications carrier of the United Kingdom until 1969. Before the Acts of Union 1707, it was the postal system of the Kingdom of England, established by Charles II in 1660. ...

of the

United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland was a sovereign state in the British Isles that existed between 1801 and 1922, when it included all of Ireland. It was established by the Acts of Union 1800, which merged the Kingdom of Great B ...

, and England's first purpose-built post office. It was demolished in 1912.

History

Originally known as the General Letter Office, the headquarters for the

(GPO) was built on the eastern side of St. Martin's Le Grand in the

City of London The City of London is a city, ceremonial county and local government district that contains the historic centre and constitutes, alongside Canary Wharf, the primary central business district (CBD) of London. It constituted most of London fr ...

between 1825 and 1829, to designs by Robert Smirke. This was the UK's second purpose-built post office. Dublin's GPO, completed in 1818 to a design by Francis Johnston, and still in use, predates it. It was built in the Grecian style with Ionic

portico A portico is a porch leading to the entrance of a building, or extended as a colonnade, with a roof structure over a walkway, supported by columns or enclosed by walls. This idea was widely used in ancient Greece and has influenced many cult ...

es, and was long and deep. The building's main facade had a central hexastyle Greek Ionic portico with

pediment Pediments are gables, usually of a triangular shape. Pediments are placed above the horizontal structure of the lintel, or entablature, if supported by columns. Pediments can contain an overdoor and are usually topped by hood moulds. A pedimen ...

, and two tetrastyle porticoes without pediments at each end. The main interior was the large letter-carriers' room, with its elegant iron gallery and spiral staircase. While externally attractive, however, the building suffered from internal shortcomings. Poor layout meant that work requiring bright light was conducted in poorly illuminated areas; odours spread from the lavatories to the kitchens, while the combination of gas lighting and poor ventilation meant that workers often felt nauseous. The expansion of the work of the Post Office also meant that by the later 19th century it was occupied well beyond its intended capacity; ''

The Times ''The Times'' is a British daily national newspaper based in London. It began in 1785 under the title ''The Daily Universal Register'', adopting its current name on 1 January 1788. ''The Times'' and its sister paper ''The Sunday Times'' (fou ...

'' reported in 1860 that "rooms have been overcrowded, closets turned into offices, extra rooms hung by tie rods to the girders of the ceiling". From 1868, the GPO experimented with the services of the

London Pneumatic Despatch Company The London Pneumatic Despatch Company (also known as the London Pneumatic Dispatch Company) was formed on 30 June 1859, to design, build and operate an underground railway system for the carrying of mail, parcels and light freight between locati ...

, which operated a pneumatic tube from

Euston railway station Euston railway station ( ; also known as London Euston) is a central London railway terminus in the London Borough of Camden, managed by Network Rail. It is the southern terminus of the West Coast Main Line, the UK's busiest inter-city railw ...

for the delivery of mail, but the experiment was unsuccessful and terminated in 1874.

Expansion

In the 1870s a new building was added on the western side of St. Martin's Le Grand to house the

telegraph Telegraphy is the long-distance transmission of messages where the sender uses symbolic codes, known to the recipient, rather than a physical exchange of an object bearing the message. Thus flag semaphore is a method of telegraphy, whereas p ...

department, and the GPO North was constructed immediately to the north of the telegraph building in the 1890s as the GPO continued to expand. To avoid confusion, the original General Post Office was renamed GPO East. When the

Central London Railway The Central London Railway (CLR), also known as the Twopenny Tube, was a deep-level, underground "tube" railwayA "tube" railway is an underground railway constructed in a cylindrical tunnel by the use of a tunnelling shield, usually deep below g ...

was constructed in 1900, a nearby station was named Post Office (now called St Paul's). The original Smirke building was closed in 1910 and demolished in 1912.

BT Centre The BT Centre was the global headquarters and registered office of BT Group, located in a 10-storey office building on Newgate Street in the City of London, London, England. It is opposite St Paul's tube station. It was completed in 1985. In 201 ...

, a post-

Second World War World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposin ...

building and the current headquarters of

BT Group BT Group plc (trading as BT and formerly British Telecom) is a British multinational telecommunications holding company headquartered in London, England. It has operations in around 180 countries and is the largest provider of fixed-line, broa ...

, now stands on the site of the old telegraph office. The only fragment that survives is the Ionic

capital Capital may refer to: Common uses * Capital city, a municipality of primary status ** List of national capital cities * Capital letter, an upper-case letter Economics and social sciences * Capital (economics), the durable produced goods used f ...

from the right-hand side of the portico. This five-ton piece was presented to Walthamstow Urban District Council and is sited in Vestry Road.

References

External link

{{Authority control Postal history of the United Kingdom Postal system of the United Kingdom 1827 establishments in the United Kingdom 1912 disestablishments in England Former buildings and structures in the City of London Demolished buildings and structures in London Buildings and structures demolished in 1912

London London is the capital and largest city of England and the United Kingdom, with a population of just under 9 million. It stands on the River Thames in south-east England at the head of a estuary down to the North Sea, and has been a majo ...

Infrastructure in London Post office buildings in the United Kingdom

History

Expansion

See also

References

External link