Nineteenth-Century Communications: A Documentary History, 1780–1918

Karin Koehler is a Senior Lecturer in Nineteenth-Century Literature at Bangor University. Her research explores the relationship between nineteenth-century literature and connective infrastructure, focusing on Anglophone and Welsh-language material.Nicola Kirkby held a Leverhulme Early Career Fellowship at Royal Holloway, London (2019-2023), investigating nineteenth-century infrastructure and literary culture. Her works include Railway Infrastructure and the Victorian Novel (forthcoming, Cambridge University Press).Kathleen McIlvenna is Senior Lecturer in History at the University of Derby. Her research focuses on histories of work, health and retirement in Victorian and Edwardian Britain. Ellen Smith is a historian and postdoctoral researcher at the University of Bristol. Her work explores communication cultures in colonial South Asia in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. Harriet M. Thompson is Visiting Research Fellow in nineteenth-century literature and culture in the Department of English, King’s College London. Her research explores the relationship between communications technologies and print culture.Eleanor Hopkins is a Senior Policy Adviser in Higher Education & Research at the British Academy. She provides strategic oversight of the Academy's Research & Development (R&D), innovation and skills policy.

• Volume 4: Nation, Empire, GlobeGeneral IntroductionVolume 4 IntroductionPart 1. Four Nations 1.1: Communications and National Identities1. ‘Post Office Communication with Ireland’, The Surveyor, Engineer, and Architect 3:31 (1842), pp. 207-209.2. ‘Barryhooragan Post Office’, Household Words, 4:150 (1853), pp. 503-504.3. ‘Post-Office Shops’, Chambers's Journal, 83 (1855), pp. 67-68.4. ‘A Provincial Post-Office’, All the Year Round, 9:201 (1863), pp. 12-16.5. ‘The Post Office and the Highlands’, Inverness Courier, 23 February 1871, p. 5.6. Edward Joseph Martyn, The Tale of a Town (London: T. Fisher Unwin, 1902), pp. 22-30.1.2 Minoritised Languages and Postal Communications 7. ‘The Gaelic Nuisance’, Chambers’s Journal, 3 November 1877, pp. 689–91 p. 38. ‘Welsh Gleanings', Cardiff Times, 28 January 1888, p. 1.9. ‘Welsh Demands. Postal Facilities', South Wales Echo, 10 April 1896, p. 3.10. Extract from ‘Mr. Herbert Lewis MP and Welsh Rural Postmen', Rhyl Record and Advertiser, 18 April 1896, p. 811. ‘The Rhyl Postmaster and the Welsh Language', Rhyl Advertiser, 23 June 1883, p. 312. ‘A Post Office Customer’, ‘An Open Letter to the Postmaster of Llandilo, J. Asher, Esq’, and Fair Play, 'Llandilo Post Office Appointment', Camarthen Weekly Reporter, 25 December 1896, p. 2.13. ‘Welsh Gossip', South Wales Daily, 17 December 1897, p. 414. Journeyman Subscriber, ‘The Post Office in Wales’, North Wales Times, 13 July 1901, p. 5.15. ‘Irish Language in the Post Office', House of Commons Debates, 25 March 1901, cc 1119-20, in The Parliamentary Debates (London: H.M. Stationery Office, 1901)Part 2: Beyond Britain and Ireland: Foreign Posts, Transnational Connection, and International Relations 2.1 Expanding Penny Postage16. Elihu Burritt, Ocean Penny Postage; its necessity shown and its feasibility demonstrated (C. Gilpin, 1849), pp. 1-24.17. Illustration: Ocean Penny Postage Envelope, Myers and Co, ca. 1850. Image Credit: Mary Evans Picture Library18. H.G. Adams, ‘Send the Letters, Uncle John’, in Elihu Burritt, Ocean Penny Postage; its necessity shown and its feasibility demonstrated (C. Gilpin, 1849), pp. 29-3119. Sophie, ‘Sophie’s Petition to Uncle John’, in Elihu Burritt, Ocean Penny Postage; its necessity shown and its feasibility demonstrated (C. Gilpin, 1849), pp. 31-32.20. John Henniker-Heaton, ‘Universal Penny Postage’, Fortnightly Review, 40:238 (Oct 1886), pp. 533-541.2.2 Creating International Standards21. Henry Derecourt, extracts from Colonial and International Postage: A Collection of Extracts, Ideas, and Information on Postal Affairs and Post Office Anomalies (London: Charles Cawley, 1854), pp. 5-9, 16-21, 38-40.22. A Correspondent, ‘The History and Constitution of the Postal Union’, Times, 15 August 1891, p. 12.2.3 Cross-Channel Communications23. Anon, ‘Curiosities of the French Postal Service’, Bentley’s Miscellany, 61 (1867), pp. 592-601.24. Anon, ‘The Dover Packet Contract’, Saturday Review, 9:231 (1860), p. 402.25. Anon., ‘The Fatal Collision off Dover’, London Review,12:289 (1866), pp. 60-61. 26. John Fowler, ‘The Channel Passage’, The Nineteenth Century 11: 61 (1882), pp. 337–345.2.4 Comparing Systems: UK and US27. Article comparing British and American Telegraph Systems, Times, 9 February 1869, p. 9.28. Werner, ‘Government Telegraphs: Benefits of a Free and Promiscuous Trade’, The Operator, 7: 81 (1877), p. 5.29. ‘American Telegraphs’, The Telegraphist, 1:10 (1884), pp. 121-122.Part 3: Imperial Communications: Labour, Language, Politics3.1 Indigenous Languages and Communication30. ‘The English Language in India’, Leader and Saturday Analyst, 9:450 (1858), p. 1200.3.2 The Aden – Zanzibar Mail Packet and Abolitionist Discourse31. ‘Postal Communication (Aden and East Africa), House of Commons Debates, 5 May 1882 (vol. 269), cc.246-63, in Hansard’s Parliamentary Debates, 3rd series, Vol 269 (London: Cornelius Buck, 1882)32. Anon., ‘Mail Service on the East Coast of Africa’, Anti-slavery reporter 3:2 (1883), pp. 45-463.3 Communication Labour and Enslavement33. Letter from D. Turnbull to Lord Palmerston on the Havana post, dated 18 December 1840. Royal Mail Steam Packet Co. West Indies Contract. Postage collected at Foreign ports by HM Consuls acting as Packet Agents Post.3.4 Imperialism and Communication Labour34. ‘Ethnographical Models’, Tallis's History and Description of the Crystal Palace and the Exhibition of the World's Industry in 1851, Illustrated by Beautiful Steel Engravings - Volume 2 (London: The London Printing and Publishing Company, 1852), pp. 192-193.3.5 Imperial Penny Postage35. John Henniker Heaton, ‘A Penny Post for the Empire’, Nineteenth Century, 27: 160 (1890), pp. 906-920.4 Imperial Communications: Systems, Routes, and Infrastructures 4.1 Thomas Waghorn and the Overland Route36. ‘The First Courier in the World', Pictorial Times, 8 November 1845, pp. 9-11.37. G. W. Wheatley, ‘Some Account of the Late Lieut. Waghorn, R.N., the Originator of the Overland Route', Bentley's Miscellany, 27 (Jan 1850): 349-357.4.2 Passages to India38. Anthony Trollope, An Autobiography (Edinburgh and London: William Blackwood and Sons, 1883), p. 164-167.39. Hyde Clarke, ‘On a Daily Mail Route to India’, Journal of the Society of the Arts, 14: 797 (1868), pp. 276-284.4.3 Experiencing Colonial Infrastructure 40. Rudyard Kipling, ‘The Overland Mail’, in Departmental Ditties, and other verses, 8th edn. (London: George Newnes, 1899), pp. 50-51.41. ‘The Indian Post Office’, Calcutta Review, 89 (1889), pp. 115-129.42. ‘Post and Telegraphs’, in Arnold Wright, Twentieth Century Impressions of Ceylon: Its History, People, Commerce (London: Lloyds Greater Britain Publishing Company, 1907), pp. 207-208.Section 4.4 Building Colonial Infrastructure43. William Wilson Hunter, extract from Rulers of India: The Marquess of Dalhousie (London: Henry Frowde, 1890), pp. 202-206.44. Nawab Sultan Jehan Begum, ‘Post and Telegraph’ in Hayat-i-shahjehani: Life of her Highness, the Late Nawab Shah Jehan Begum of Bhopal, C.I., G.C.S.I. (Bombay: The Times Press, 1926), pp. 54-55.45. T.A.C., ‘Telegraph Construction in the “Forest Primeval”’, Good Words, 19 (1878), pp. 430-432.Part 5. Settler Colonialism and Emigration 5.1 Emigrants’ Letters46. Charles Dickens, ‘A Bundle of Emigrants’ Letters’, Household Words, 1 (1850), pp. 19-24. 47. M. J. Thayers, ‘Letters from Home’, in A Wreath of Wild Flowers (Toronto: Morton, 1877), p. 57. 48. Emilie Matilda Australie Heron, ‘The Emigrant’s Plaint’, in The Balance of Pain and Other Poems (London: 1877), pp. 79-80.49. Julia A. Mathews, extracts from Millie’s Journal; or The Emigrant’s Letters (London: Joseph Masters, 1857), pp. 30-545.2 Experiencing Settler Colonial Infrastructure50. K.J. Lord, 'Her Majesty's Mail in the Far West', Leisure Hour, 836 (1876), pp. 8-11.51. ‘A New Zealand Mail-Day', Argosy, 38 (1884), pp. 227-229.52. 'Mail-Day at the Antipodes', Graphic, 20 July 1889, pp. 74-75.Part 6. Resistance, Conflict, and War 6.1 The Telegraph in Crimea53. 'Electric Telegraph for the Seat of War.--Plough for Laying the Wire', Illustrated London News, 11 November 1854, p. 26. Credit: Illustrated London News Ltd./Mary Evans Picture Library.54. ‘The Electric Telegraph’, Times, 21 May 1855, p. 86.2 Mail Steamers and the US Civil War55. Anon., ‘America and our Mail Steamers’, Liverpool Journal of Commerce, 26 December 1861, p. 3.6.3 The 1857 Indian Revolt and Communication56. ‘Mutiny in India’, Illustrated London News, 4 July 1857, pp. 1-257. P. V. Luke, ‘How the Electric Telegraph Saved India’, Macmillan’s Magazine, 75 (1897), pp. 401-4066.4 The Morant Bay Rebellion and Postal Infrastructure58. ‘Mr Lake’s Report of the Trial’ and ‘Statement of Elizabeth Jane Gough’, in Facts and documents relating to the alleged Rebellion in Jamaica, and the measures of repression: including notes of the trial of Mr. Gordon (London: Jamaica Committee, 1866), pp. 46-48 and p. 59.6.5 Fictions of Resistant Labour59. John Le Breton, ‘Govind the Runner’, Graphic Midsummer Number, 27 June 1908, pp. 885-888.6.6 Military Signals60. Richard Kerr, ‘Supposed Oriental Powers of Signalling Through Space without Wires’, extract from Wireless Telegraph: Popularly Explained (London: Seeley and Co., 1898), pp. 1-8.61. ‘How Soldiers Signal’, Strand Magazine, 18:108 (1899), pp. 720-7236.7 Communication and the Poetry of War62. George Meredith, ‘Grandfather Bridgeman’, in The Poetic Works of George Meredith (1919), pp. 1-28.63. Thomas Hardy, 'A Wife in London', Poems of the Past and Present (London: Macmillan, 1903), pp. 21-22.BibliographyIndex