THE POSTAL ARRANGEMENTS AND THE FLOOD.

Clutha Leader, Volume V, Issue 222, 11 October 1878, Page 6

THE POSTAL ARRANGEMENTS AND THE FLOOD.

TO THE EDITOR. Sir, — As a very great amount of dissatisfaction and annoyance lias been felt throughout the whole of the Clutha district south of the river at the entire stoppage ,of the mail service during the fortnight the flood has lasted, I trust you "will allow me space to call attention to the matter. I ask this because the inconvenience and annoyance has been so universal, and as some blame one and some another it is right that the matter should be ventilated and enquired into, so that if blame there be it should be laid at the right door, and if the stoppage has been unavoidable all humanity — including, postoffice officials — should be exonerated, and the onus thrown upon the disordered elements of nature. Well, then, between Tuesday, the; 24th of September, and Monday, 7th October, the service to Warepa, Waitepeka, Puerua, Port Molyneux, Catlins, and other districts was stopped. We neither could receive nor send away letters. We could get no news of the floods, or of what was occurring outside the district, as the Leader's of the 27th September arid 4th October were detained by the postal authorities' till the 7th of October. During that time the whole inhabitants of Balclutha had been driven from their houses, and they were deprived of the ordinary means of communicating with us or their friends at a distance, so as to procure whatever assistance could be given. Surely only the most insuperable obstacle can be regarded as any excuse for this indifference— or, I may say, heartless cruelty- In the latter light it is regarded by many. To give you some small idea of the annoyances to 1 which the whole settlers and others of the districtssouth of the river have been subjected, I will only mention a few. The Ist of . this month. ' was the half-yearly balance of the Bank of New Zealand and the National Bank, and some of us usually have small balances ' to square' up at that time. > .This we were prevented from doing by the stoppage of the mails, and thus, besides the annoyance, our credit has in some cases been injured.^ = I have also to mention that the storekeepers render their accounts on the Ist of' the month, and they again have their acceptances, to meet. on the 4th. I do not know how it stood with the latter— the acceptances ; but it was impossible for us to': remit the amount of ourbills, because of the stoppage of tlie mails.., -Tliien T. have also to' state ihat when the, mails from;^alcJtutha; to.theivarious 'districts 1 4t -was. on'{a:.Monday. ;-» Wesend ;to "the;Lpbst-qfi&^ mail^^^ay^lTueMays and 'Wnd&fit ; Wheii we callecl torsay we got a fortnight's papers

and our letters, but the mail had gone yesterday, and we could not send any away. This is the more annoying, as all our letters and papers for the home mail should have gone to-day.- They will now be too late for the mail, and our friends; at home will see of the flood in the Clutha district, and having neither letters nor papers from us they will naturally come to the very erroneous conclusion that a great evil has befallen us. Now, supposing it had been impossible to forward the mails between the 24th and the 7th the fact that they were sent yesterday and that the water was still falling was sufficient evidence they could have been sent to-day and our mails taken from here. That they were not requires explanation. I might have mentioned many other reasons to urge an enquiry, but I think I have said enough. I have blamed no one, and do not intend to do.. Everyone knows a palpable failure has occurred in the postal service in-this district, and the public have a right to know how it has occurred and, that provision is to be made against a similar break-down in the future. One thing is plain — viz., that if every serious, flood that occurs in the Clutha river is to be so felt at Balclutha that the whole mails must be detained there till the flood subsides, then another route must be selected for the mails. They could easily be crossed at Te Houka or Clydevale, or in fact at any point up the river, and notwithstanding the injury this might do to Balclutha I fear something of the kind is the only way of preventing the break-down and consequent annoyance we have had. I regret having trespassed so far on your space, but as a large number of your readers have a strong feeling xipon this subject I trust you will excuse it. — I am, &c, Enquirer,. South Molyneux, Oct. 8, 1878.