The new deputies so reorganized the service that the trips were made weekly throughout the year, and they shortened the time by one-half; and many other improvements were made.[46] For a time the expenditure of the post office largely outran the revenue. But the usual rewards of additional facilities to the public followed.
In 1757, when the outlay had reached its highest point, and the public response to the increased facilities was still but feeble, the post office was over 900 in debt to the deputy postmasters general. Three years later this debt was entirely cleared off, and the operations showed a surplus of 278. In 1761 the surplus reached the amount of 494, and this sum was transmitted to the general post office in London.
The receipt of this first remittance was the occasion of much satisfaction to the postmasters general. For a generation the post office in America had been nearly forgotten. Since 1721, it had cost the home office nothing for its maintenance, and for long before that time it had yielded nothing to the treasury, and so it had been allowed to plod along unregarded.
A remittance from this source was quite unexpected, and one can imagine the pleasure with which the entry was made in the treasury book, and the words added "this is the first remittance ever made of its kind."[47]
But though the first, it was by no means the last; for until Franklin's dismissal in 1774, a remittance from the American post office was an annual occurrence. Franklin declared that, at the time of his dismissal, the American office yielded a revenue three times that from Ireland.[48]
The success of the post office under Franklin's regime suggests the question, as to the share Franklin had in that success. During the whole course of his administration, he had with him an associate deputy postmaster general, William Hunter, from 1753 until 1761, and John Foxcroft, from 1761 until his connection with the post office ceased.
Little is known of the capacity of either of these officials; of Hunter, practically nothing. Foxcroft was certainly a man of intelligence, but nothing is known to warrant the belief that he possessed unusual qualities. That the routine of post office management was left in the hands of the associates, may be inferred not so much from the multifarious character of Franklin's activities, for he seems to have been equal to any demands made upon him, as from the fact that out of the twenty-one years of his administration, fifteen years were spent in England as the representative of the province of Pennsylvania in its negotiations with the home government.
That Franklin's occupations in England did not absorb all his time is amply proven by his voluminous correspondence which shows him to have been engaged in abstruse speculations in science, and in economic and philosophic studies. But to administer an institution like the post office one must be on the spot, and the Atlantic ocean lay between him and his work from May 1757, until November 1762, and from November 1764, until his dismissal in 1774. Franklin was in America while the measures were taken which put the post office on an efficient footing, and again in 1763, when the treaty of Paris confirmed England in her possession of Canada.
Franklin's contribution to the North American post office consisted mainly, it would seem, in certain important ideas, the application of which turned a half century of failure into an immediate success. It is a commonplace that money spent in increased facilities to the public is sure of a speedy return with interest, and in private enterprises competition keeps this principle in fairly active employment.
This is not the case with an institution like the post office, until, at least, each new application of the principle had been justified by success. A post office is a monopoly, and at certain stages of its history that fact has been its bane. To-day when the demands of social and commercial intercourse make an efficient vehicle for the transmission of correspondence a necessity, the evils inherent in monopolies sink out of sight so far as the post office is concerned.
A peremptory public takes the place of competitors as a motive for alertness. The faults of the institution are freely exposed, and correction insisted upon; and, what is as much to the point, the public contributes of its ingenuity for the improvement of the service. When, towards the end of the eighteenth century, the British public was disgusted with the slowness of its mail carts, and dismayed at the number of robberies, Palmer, a Bath theatre manager, came forward with his scheme for the employment of fast passenger coaches for the conveyance of the mails.
A half century later the public united in a demand for lower postage rates; and Rowland Hill, a schoolmaster, produced a scheme, which for originality and efficacy, has given him a high place among the inventors of the world. To-day the Universal Postal Union affords a medium by means of which the results achieved by every postal administration are brought into a common stock for the benefit of all.
But when Franklin took hold of the North American post office, he had none of these aids to improvement. The measure of the public interest in the post office may be taken from the fact that its total revenue during the first three years of his administration, from 1753 to 1756, was 938 16_s._ 10_d._--but little more than 300 a year.
As for encouragement or stimulus from the outside, there was none. The only connection the American post office had was with the home office; and it is doubtful whether, even if it had been disposed, the British post office could have lent any helpful advice in those days.
The British post office was at that time passing through one of its unprogressive periods. It had come to know by long years of observation what was the volume of correspondence which would be offered for exchange, and it provided the means of transmission, taking care that these should not cost more than the receipts.
Franklin's merit lay in his rising above an indolent reliance on his monopoly, and in his generous outlay for additional facilities, by means of which he not only drew to the post office a large amount of business, which was falling into other hands, but called into existence another class of correspondence altogether.
It is tolerably certain that had Franklin's work lay in England instead of America, he would have anticipated Palmer's suggestion that the stage coaches be used for the conveyance of the mails, instead of the wretched mail carts which came to be regarded as the natural prey of the highwayman.
At the beginning of 1764 the post riders between New York and Philadelphia made three trips a week each way; and at such a rate of speed that a letter could be sent from one place to the other and the answer received the day following.[49] In reporting this achievement to the general post office, Franklin states that the mails travel by night as well as by day, which had never been done before in America.
Franklin planned to have trips of equal speed made between New York and Boston in the spring of 1764, and the time for letter and reply between the two places reduced from a fortnight to four days. When his arrangements were completed a letter and its reply might pass between Boston and Philadelphia in six days, instead of three weeks.
As a result of these arrangements Franklin anticipated that there would be a large increase in the number of letters passing between Boston and Philadelphia and Great Britain by the packets from New York. That the fruits of his outlay answered his expectations is clear from the fact that the revenues, which up to the year 1756 had scarcely exceeded 300 a year, mounted up to 1100[50] in 1757, and that became the normal revenue for some time after.
It was during this period that the British government began to employ packet boats for the conveyance of the mails to the American colonies.
Until this time there had been no regular arrangements for the conveyance of the mails between Great Britain and the colonies. There were no vessels under specific engagement to leave either Great Britain or America at any fixed time.
This is not, of course, to say that there were no means of exchanging correspondence between England and America, or even that the post office had no control over the vessels by which letters were carried. Vessels were continually passing between Falmouth or Bristol and New York or Boston in the course of trade; and these were employed for the conveyance of mails. Sometimes the letters were made up in sealed bags by the post office before being handed to the shipmasters; and sometimes they were handed loose to the captains, or picked up from the coffee houses.
The captains were under heavy penalties to hand over to the post office all letters in their possession, when they reached their port of destination, and they were entitled to one penny for each letter so delivered to the local postmasters. By this arrangement, the cost of carrying the letters across the Atlantic fell in no degree upon the post office. Indeed, after the act of 1710, the post office made a very good bargain of the business. The postmasters paid the shipmasters a penny a letter, and the act of 1710 authorized them to collect a shilling for each letter delivered to the public.
A service so irregular had its disadvantages, however. Captains were of all degrees of trustworthiness. Some could be depended upon to deliver the letters at the post office as the law directed; others were careless or unfaithful. These either did not deposit their letters with the postmasters promptly as they should have done, or they had private understandings with friends by which the letters did not go into the post office at all, but were delivered by the captains directly to the persons to whom they were directed.
In 1755 the board of trade called attention to the great "delays, miscarriages and other accidents which have always attended the correspondence between this kingdom and His Majesty's colonies in America, from the very precarious and uncertain method in which it has been usually carried on by merchant ships." The remedy sought was a line of sailing vessels devoted entirely to the conveyance of correspondence.
Services of this class were not uncommon, although they were usually confined to a time of war. During the war of Spanish Succession, packet ships ran regularly to Holland and to France.
It was during this war when French and Spanish privateers held the southern seas, that the first line of mail packets was established, which ran to North America. In 1705, the British government contracted for five vessels of one hundred and forty tons each, to carry the mails to and from the West Indies.[51] Each vessel was to carry twenty-six men and ten guns. The contractor was paid 12,500 a year.
A curious feature of the contract was that the contractor was required to enter into a warranty that the receipts from the vessels for mails and passengers would not be less than 8000. If they did not come up to this amount, the contractor had to make up the shortage, up to the sum of 4500 a year. The contract was for three years certain, with an additional two years if the war should last so long.
The postal business of the West Indies was comparatively large at the beginning of the eighteenth century. The receipts for the two years ending January 1706--10,112[52]--make the American continental business, even under Franklin's capable management, very small by comparison. In 1760 the receipts from the colonial post office of North America were only 1100. This packet service to the West Indies was maintained until the peace of Utrecht in 1713.
During the same period, repeated efforts were made by English merchants, to have a packet service to the North American colonies. In 1704 a petition was presented to the government for a mail service between England and New York.[53] The petitioners asked that the vessels be employed for letters only, in order that by their greater speed they might outrun the merchant vessels on their homeward trips and by giving timely notice, make it possible to send out cruisers to meet the merchant vessels and escort them home in safety. They observed that, in the year before, eighteen of the Virginia fleet were captured because they had set out later than was expected.
The treasury were unimpressionable. They read the memorial, and after adding to it the curt query "Whether the merchants intend to be at the charge," they dismissed it from further consideration. In 1707, the question was again brought to the attention of the treasury, and they asked Blathwayt, a commissioner of trade, to give them a report upon it.
Blathwayt was hearty in support of the proposition.[54] He declared that "Her Majesty's plantations in America are at present the chief support of the kingdom without impairing their own proper strength and yet capable of very great improvements by their trade and other means." He pressed for the establishment of a service with trips six or eight times a year. In view of the war, however, Blathwayt considered it inadvisable to fix upon a certain rendezvous on either side of the Atlantic, as this would enhance the opportunities for interception by the enemy.
The treasury were willing to have one or two experimental trips made to ascertain what revenue might be expected from the service, if these could be secured without expense; and they accepted a proposition, made about this time, by Sir Jeffry Jeffrys, who was preparing to make two trips to New York.[55] Jeffrys asked that his vessel might be commissioned as a packet boat, and that he might be allowed to retain the postage on all the correspondence which he carried between England and America. There is no record of the result, but from what is known of the postal business in America, it cannot be supposed that it would be of a magnitude to encourage the establishment of a packet service.
Other offers were made to the government, but they were not seriously considered until the outbreak of the war in America between England and France in 1744. Orders were at once given for the restoration of the packet service to the West Indies; and in 1745 armed packets again carried the mails on this route.[56] The service was very expensive; for though the revenue reached the respectable figure of 3921 in the first year, this amount was far from covering the outlay; and as soon as the treaty of Aix-la-Chapelle was signed in 1749, the packets were discontinued.
The peace, which followed the treaty of Aix-la-Chapelle, was of short duration. So far as America was concerned, the treaty did little more than to impose upon the combatants a momentary suspension of arms. It did nothing to remove the causes of war, and while these remained a permanent peace was impossible.
The grounds of dispute were almost entirely territorial. The French claimed the whole vast stretch of country to the west of the Alleghanies, and set up a line of forts along the valley of the Alleghany and Ohio rivers. The English disregarded these claims, and their traders pushed over the mountains into the disputed territory. The French displayed so much energy in dispossessing the encroaching English, that the border country was kept in a state of alarm, and the governors of the English colonies appealed to have a regular means of communication established between the mother country and the colonies, so that help might be obtained if required.
The representations of governors Shirley of Massachusetts, Delancey of New York, and Dinwiddie of Virginia, were vigorously supported by governor Lawrence of Nova Scotia.[57]
The situation of Nova Scotia was one of peculiar danger. The province was hemmed in between Cape Breton, with its powerful fortress at Louisburg, on the one side, and Canada on the other. The control which the French exercised over the valley of the St. John, and over the isthmus of Baie Verte, gave them a safe and easy passage from Canada to Cape Breton, by way of the St. John river, the bay of Fundy, the isthmus of Baie Verte, and the straits of Northumberland. The Acadians who were scattered over Nova Scotia were naturally in hearty sympathy with their own people in Cape Breton; and in order to send supplies of cattle to the fortress, they made a small settlement at Tatamagouche, on the straits of Northumberland, which served as an entrepot.[58]
The first result of the appeal of the governors was the establishment of a post office at Halifax, in the spring of 1755,[59] and the opening up of communication with New England by the vessels which plied to and from Boston. It required a ruder prompting before the government could be induced to spend the money necessary for a packet service, and this was not long in coming.
In the early spring of 1755, General Braddock, with two regiments, was sent to America to oppose the large claims made by the French. In concert with the governors of Massachusetts and Virginia, a plan of attack was arranged which involved movements against four different points as widely separated as fort Duquesne on the Ohio river, and Beausejour on the bay of Fundy.
Braddock undertook the expedition against fort Duquesne, which if successful would break down the barrier which was confining the English colonies to the Atlantic seaboard, and relieve the more westerly settlements of Virginia and Pennsylvania from the harassing attacks which were making life on the frontiers unendurable. The execution of his part of the campaign was beset by difficulties, arising partly from the mountainous and woody character of the country through which he had to pass, and partly from his ignorance of the methods of forest warfare, in which his enemies excelled.
Whatever could be accomplished by dogged energy was done successfully.
Braddock managed to get his army within sight of his destination. But here his good fortune left him. While still in the thick woods he was attacked by the French and their Indian allies. Employing methods to which Braddock was a stranger, methods which would have seemed to him to be unworthy of soldiers, the French and their allies managed to keep themselves in perfect cover, while the British army stood exposed, the easiest of marks.
There could be but one outcome. The British were overwhelmed and Braddock slain; and the only result of the campaign was to redouble the fury of the enemy against the unfortunate border settlements.
The disaster and its consequences were brought home to the government with a directness that put an end to all hesitation about establishing the closest possible communication between the mother country and the colonies. On the 18th of September, the board of trade, which administered the affairs of the colonies, approached the treasury on the subject. After emphasizing the inconveniences of the existing arrangements, the board insisted that it was of the highest importance that the king should have "early and frequent intelligence of what is in agitation" in the colonies, and recommended that packet boats be established to New York.[60]
The treasury approved, and directed the postmasters general to arrange for regular monthly trips to New York, and to restore the West Indian service, which was discontinued in 1749. Four vessels of 150 tons each were provided for the latter route.[61] They were to carry twenty-six men each, and be fully armed for war.
For the New York route, larger vessels were thought necessary, owing to the roughness of the winter seas; the vessels placed on this line were each of 200 tons, and carried thirty men. The carrying of any merchandise was forbidden, so that the vessels were devoted entirely to the service of the post office.
In the elaborate instructions which the commanders received, they were directed, when they had a mail for a place at which a postmaster had not been appointed, to open the bags themselves, and deliver the letters for that place to a magistrate or other careful man, who would undertake to have the letters handed to the persons to whom they were addressed. In case the vessel was attacked, and could not avoid being taken, the commander must, before striking, throw the mails overboard, with such a weight attached as would immediately sink them, and so prevent them from falling into the enemy's hands.
The new service was a most expensive one, and when peace was concluded in 1762, the question of continuing it came up for immediate consideration. During the seven years of its course, the New York service cost 62,603; while the produce in postage was only 12,458. The service was popular, however; and the revenue had been increasing latterly, and an effort was made to reduce the cost.[62] In this the postmasters general were successful, and as the treasury saw reasons for indulging the hope that before long the service would be self-sustaining, they sanctioned the amended terms.
So far as the district in the neighbourhood of New York was concerned, the service was very satisfactory. But the people in the more remote southern colonies had ground for complaint in the length of time it took for their letters to reach them after arriving at New York.
No time was lost in despatching the couriers to the south; but, at the best, between bad roads and no roads at all, there were great delays in delivering the mails to Charlestown. In the fall of 1763, a proposition was made to extend the West Indies service to the mainland, and to require the mail packet to visit Pensacola, fort St. Augustine and Charlestown, before returning to Falmouth.