Prussian postal system

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This article describes the Prussian postal system from its historical beginnings to the beginning of the 19th century. For the Prussian postal history of the 19th century see Prussia (Postal History and Postage Stamps) .

History of the Prussian postal system

The beginnings of the Prussian postal service can be found in the 13th century , as early as 1276 the Teutonic Order had organized a station-wise transport of letters between the friars and knights among each other and further. These institutions originating from the Marienburg monastery are considered to be the basis of the Prussian postal system.

After the dissolution of the Teutonic Order through the Krakow Peace Treaty in 1525, no document reports that this messenger post continued to exist. Later we can only read about sovereign messengers sent by designated people. The village mayors in East Prussia and Prussian-Lithuania were then obliged to have the letters and orders delivered from office to office. This facility was called "Ämter-Posten".

At the same time, the messengers in the Brandenburg brands were in perfect order. The sovereign, the government authorities and the residents had to take care of the transport themselves, but there were already messengers who ran the messenger like a trade. All the rulings related to these same messengers.

The regular messenger connections between the Hanseatic cities were already introduced in Kurbrandenburg . The arrival times were noted on a receipt and the delivery wages were paid after a formal calculation. The messengers came on horseback or in a single horse and carriage if they brought a lot of letters and small packages. Everywhere they came through, they collected letters and then delivered them.

At the beginning of the 16th century, the name "postman" was first used to denote these messengers. The oldest sovereign messenger mail is documented for the route from Küstrin to Ansbach . Elector Albrecht resided in Ansbach as the owner of the Mark Brandenburg and the Franconian Lands and kept in touch with the Mark through this messenger mail. His successor, Elector Johann, increased the number of messengers and routes. Under the rule of Electors Johann I and II from 1499 to 1571, the letters were ordered by 30 sworn messengers who were paid for by the court renters in Cölln (Berlin). The messengers, whose wages were set arbitrarily, arranged the connection to the messenger lines to Bohemia, Saxony, Austria, Holland and Denmark etc.

In 1550, under the rule of Joachim II and his brother, Margrave Joachim V of Küstrin , the first messenger order was issued. A regular messenger mail was called from Cüstrin via Trebbin, Zinna and Annaburg to Wittenberg. In Wittenberg there was a connection to the electoral Saxon messengers to Dresden, Vienna and Heidelberg. In 1583, Elector Johann Georg and Elector August von Sachsen issued a “new and improved messenger regulation” . On May 28, 1589, another messenger post was set up via Hof, Schleitz, Roda, Naumburg to Halle and from here with the Lüneburg authorities to Celle.

A messenger had to be present in each of the places mentioned, who immediately carried the letters handed over to him by the arriving messenger to the next station, day or night. At each of these messenger exchanges, a post office administrator accepted the lost parcel of letters, recorded it in a book and handed it to the outgoing messenger with a post note on the hour of arrival and departure.

On December 15, 1600, Elector Joachim Friedrich wrote to the cathedral chapter of Magdeburg “about the messenger mail that had been sent via Zinna to Annaburg for many and unthinkable years”. Three years later, a messenger post from Brandenburg to Stettin and, from November 13, 1604, a messenger post with a change of messenger from office to office via Landek and Neuhof to Marienwerder were set up in order to get the stately letters to and from Prussia faster.

In 1610, Elector Johann Sigismund established a messenger mail for the countries Cleve, Mark and Ravensburg, which were inherited in 1608: the bailiff Ohm from Zehden had to transport the letters brought to him to Prussia by messengers on horseback from town to town. The recipient of the letter had to issue a receipt that was to be returned.

This "first erected riding post" in Brandenburg, Prussia was founded five years before the count of Taxis was raised as Reich General Hereditary Postmaster in Germany.

The hostilities leading up to the Thirty Years War required a thoroughgoing improvement in the entire postal system. On June 20, 1610, the elector issued "a new post and messenger order", which prescribed the sworn chancellery or postman exactly how much wages and allowances they were entitled to according to distance and time of year. The messengers were already going to Mainz, Speyer, Darmstadt, Braunschweig, Copenhagen, Cleve, Vienna, Cracow, etc. However, the foot messengers were always the cause of complaints, and so the elector Georg Wilhelm ordered the horse mail set up in 1610 from Zehden to Marienwerder to get more regulated.

In 1618, with the Thirty Years' War, transport problems began, so that field or army couriers on horseback were often used to get through enemy territory.

With the assumption of office of the Elector Friedrich Wilhelm , the mail on horseback was significantly expanded; In 1646 a mounted messenger mail was set up to Russia and Warsaw. So it was possible to send a letter from Russia to Cleve with the same post.

After the Peace of Westphalia in 1648, the post office in Prussia immediately picked up again and new posts were set up. In 1652, the Secret State Councilor, Imperial Baron Otto von Schwerin, was appointed Ober-Post-Director and in 1654 the Hofrentmeister Michael Matthias was appointed as the supervisor of the posts. It was mainly he who prevented the Prussian postal system from coming under Thurn-und-Taxis administration.

The 17th and early 18th centuries saw the Prussian Post continue to develop further. On August 10, 1712, the long-prepared "New Postal Order" appeared - a new postal law adapted to the times . A postal rate calculated according to the local distances was prepared for the existing 99 post offices.

The extra post

Prussian post office sign

Until 1712, some post offices had a kind of post office, but the journeys of the messengers were carried out with service or mail drives, albeit with the Post's own horses. There was no regulation with which the carter had to drive. On June 8, 1659, the validity of all issued passports was revoked. The newly appointed mail wagon master created a role (list) of the drivers and distributed the loads according to the order in this role. The carter had to pay 7 groschen for each horse and per mile, of which 2 groschen of each taler had to be paid to the post office box of the place of departure as compensation for the personal money the post office had lost. The edicts of 1710, 1711 and 1712 brought driving with post horses under the name “ Extra-Post ” as a sovereign institution and thus as part of the postal system ... Driving with “wage driving” was viewed as a civil trade and was therefore subject to special regulations .

Another expansion of the posts came with the accession of Frederick the Great in 1748, but also in 1766, at the time of the French postal administration. Bernard and de la Hogue were appointed as artistic directors and Moret as director of all the postal services. These three French called meetings of the Prussian postal officials. The Post-Commission introduced the new facilities, which lasted until the war year 1808. The new facilities were the constitution of the post offices and a fixed rate of payment as postage wages, adjusted to the change in grain prices, as well as the increased rates of the postage tax that was prepared at every post office. The reloading of the freight items was abolished, instead continuous wagons were purchased that went from station to station. A very cumbersome service briefing was written. The regulations for the carters and the extra mail system were created. The postage freedom was restricted. This was all three years' work, then the French officials were fired. The time of French directing was over, the regulations remained.

On November 18, 1782, the "New Postal Code" was issued. With the end of the 18th and the beginning of the 19th century, the Prussian postal service was almost completely changed.

First, the station distances were given in miles so that every traveler could work out how much he had to pay for the trip. The previously disputed sentences have now been settled by geometrically measuring the main routes. This measurement has not yet had any influence on the letter tax.

In addition, the mail haulage system was improved. The sub-leasing of the post offices was subjected to precise controls. As a result of this forbidden practice, there were repeated complaints, as the sub-tenants had to pay a rent to the actual tenant in addition to their own livelihood and had to achieve this by saving on the car and driver. In addition, there was a great temptation to transport non-registered travelers. A thaler fine was collected for every groschen of rent. The wages and riding salaries were adjusted to the local grain prices and, if necessary, support from the post office was granted. The “morality” of the “raw” postilions was improved by often military punishments and instruction. A commission of domestic and foreign experts was formed to improve the wagons. They had to produce models and test wagons. Comfortable and fast cars with a large capacity were required. The rights and obligations of the extra postal system were regulated by an ordinance of October 22nd, 1800, as there had often been disputes here.

The post inspectors were checked and new ones hired. They had to check the postal system in their district by traveling all the time, to make sure that the postal service was expedient, that the postal officials were responsible for their administration, and that new postal systems and post routings were proposed. These men were responsible for the post as the first representatives of the Ober-Post authority. Ultimately, the postal taxes used since 1788 were rearranged.

The Luneviller Peace of 1801 and the Reichsdeputationshauptschluss of 1803 made Prussia one of the main postal states. In 1805 Prussia occupied the Hanoverian territories and introduced the Prussian postal system here as well. The war from 1806 to 1813 prevented an improvement in the postal system, it kept going rather poorly.

The expansion of the territory through the war led to increased transport. The new parts of the area were carefully converted to the Prussian postal system and the posts and post offices in the old areas were put in order.

Prussian postal facilities

The following postal facilities existed in Prussia at that time:

  • 1. Mounted posts : They were used for the quick delivery of letters and newspapers. Even if the letter felleisen (letter bundles) were driven by courier with two horses, these items keep this designation.
  • 2. Ordinary-driving posts : They carried people, parcels and money, as well as heavy letters and newspapers and were accompanied by Schirrmeister
  • 3. Schnellposten , Eilwagen : The above-mentioned commission made it possible to set up this category. On January 1, 1819, the first express mail ran between Berlin and Magdeburg and on July 1, 1820 between Koblenz and Trier under the name of Personenwagen . If more travelers were to be carried than there was space on the wagon, the post office provided Beichaisen . In addition to letters and newspapers, the express car also carried money letters and small packages. Up to 10 miles at the normal tariff, over 10 miles a surcharge of 50% of the tax was payable. Fonts up to 18 lots were subject to the postage tax, above this an accompanying address was required, and the parcel postage was applied with a surcharge of 50%.
  • 4. Personnel posts : The posts with 12 to 15 seats were slower but popular. They mainly drove - without surcharge - on routes where express posts did not yet operate. Post dilligences and journaling used to run on these routes .
  • 5. Goods post : The express and personal post made this transport option necessary and only transported heavy goods, not people. The income was never in equilibrium with the income.
  • 6. Karriol -Posten : They connect unimportant places with the nearest post office or with the next coursen. Without passenger transport, if they did, the personal money remained with the post office owner, and they took the place of a horse and carriage mail connection.
  • 7. Water posts , sailing and steam ships : For the account of the post, such a post connection was maintained between Stralsund and Ystad in Sweden and to Copenhagen in the summer months. Steam ships drove between Lübeck and Petersburg and docked on the New West Pomerania coast, thus establishing a Prussian-Russian postal connection.
  • 8. Messenger or foot post : Up until 1825 there were men sworn in and paid by the post in Prussia who transported letters, small packages and money between the individual post offices up to the amount of the deposit. They wore postal clothes and were not allowed to accept or deliver letters etc. The post offices were not allowed to accept consignments from local residents and residents of the surrounding area to residents of small towns, small towns, individual country estates, villages, forest houses, mills, etc. that were not on the Poststrasse. Even the private messengers who picked up the post from the post office were not allowed to be asked to provide courier services without further ado. In places with authorities this was a major handicap, as each authority now had to employ its own messengers.

Since 1825 it was permitted to employ land, foot, or postmen . Two or three times a week they delivered letters, addresses, newspapers and official gazettes for a fee in the vicinity of the postal district and, again for a fee, accepted such items. The country mail carriers were contracted and paid by the postal service, the order money flowed into the post office and should cover the costs of this service.

  • 9. Stadt-Post-Expeditions : They were set up in Berlin and several other main towns and their tasks correspond roughly to today's postmen.
  • 10. Extra-Post-Couriere and Estafetten transport : This facility was unprofitable, the expedition fees for sending private Estafetten were insignificant as income. Urgent service letters were mainly sent

The transport facilities 1 to 8 and 10 already existed before the reorganization of the post office after the war in 1813, the country mail carriers and the city post expeditions were set up later. When the letters were carried by messengers between the post offices, the gap to the home order was closed. A post corresponding to the time, as we understand it, was created.

literature

  • German postal almanac. 1842, Braunschweig,
  • Mattias: History of the Prussian postal system and representation of the postal system in the Prussian states. Berlin 1816.

See also