Sea Mail

Introduction – A Brief History of Overseas Postal Services to 1874

(Taken from an unpublished manuscript by Geoffrey H. Manning titled Glenelg – 1836-1936,

A Social History – copy in State Library.)

If a jetty was built at Glenelg a steamer’s mail could be delivered in Adelaide within three hours after she came within sight of the signalman at Glenelg and the mail of an outward-bound vessel could remain open in Adelaide to within the hour of her leaving. Under the existing system if a steamer was advertised to [be at] the Lighthouse at 5 or 6 o’clock in the evening her mails would have closed at 11 or 12 o’clock in the morning of that day. Frequently it was necessary to wait until the next day for the mails of a steamer signalised on the previous one, and one or more steamship companies refused to send their boats to Port Adelaide.