THE KING'S PRIVATE POST OFFICE.

Taranaki Daily News, Volume LIII, Issue 306, 20 May 1911, Page 9

THE KING'S PRIVATE POST OFFICE.

AX ACCOUNT ("IK THE WOKK AND DUTIES OK TIIK COURT POSTMASTER. Tho postal and telegraphic department attiiclicd. to tlic Royal Household is under the control of Air. llilcy, who acted for several years as 1 !u! Court postmaster in the late reign and was reappointed to the position by King George on Ins Majesty's accession. The headquarters of the Court postoffice are at Buckingham Palace, but a temporary ollicc is established at wherever the King may be staying, under the direction of Mr. llilcy, who always travels with the Court. The posf-ollice at llurkingiiam Palace consists ill' three lai'uv apartments; one is fitted up as a telegraphic gallery, another as a sorting room, and a third as a general office. There is al-o a telephone exchange attached to the post-oliice, where three operators are employed. The letters for the King and 'Juoen and members of the Household are delivered !o liuckingham Palace from the General Post (Illice si\ times a day, the lirst delivery being made at seven o clock in the morning. The mail, on its arrival at the postoffice, is at once sorted (there are four sorters on duty throughout the day) and made up into separate packets for the King, Queen, members of the Royal family, resident officials in the Household and the servants. MAILS -IN" AXD -OCT.'' The whole mail is. by the way, carefully counted before if is sorted, and the number of letters received is entered in ,i book called "Mails in." After the packets for delivery throughout the Palace have been made lip the number of letters in each packet is counted and entered in a book labelled ''Mails out," and the numbers in both books must, of course, be the same. As soon as the mails have been sorted they are given to two of the Palace postmen, who deliver them to their respective departments. The letters for the King and Queen are delivered to the equerries' department and are placed in the secretaries' rooms by an equarry. The letters .or members of the Household are delivered to their rspectivc private rooms, and the letters for the male servants are delivered to the steward's waiting-room, where they are put into a large rack, from which they are taken by servants between 'J.311 and 10.30 a.m.. and 7.H0 and 8.30 p.m. The letters for the female servants are, delivered to the head housekeeper's room, and are dealt with in the same manner as the letters for the male servants. There are six large mahogany pillarboxes throughout Buckingham Palace, where letters can be posted by members of the Household. These boxes are cleared levery two hours and the contents made up into mail bags at the Palace) post-office, from whence they are dispatched to the General post-office six times a day. All the King's letters, whether on State or private business, are marked "official paid," and need not be stamped, neither need any letters on State business written by a member of the Household, but all the private letters of members of the Household must be stamped in the usual manner. Apart from the ordinary mail business I the Court postmaster has a considerable I quantity of despatches for special delivery to attend to, which are not passed through the bands of the General Post I Office. Numbers of despatches to the chief Government offices and to many private individuals are sent out from Buckingham Palace every day when the court is in residence in London, lucse are delivered by one of the four special messengers attached to the Court postoffice. Two of these officials deliver mes* sages in London only, but the other two must be ready to start for any pan of the United Kingdom at a moment's notice. Each of these two has always a kit-bag packed ready for travelling in the Court pdst-offiee. ROYAL TELEGRAMS. ■ Urgent despatches for the Continent are sent to the Foreign Office, from whence the King's messengers are instructed as to their delivery. The telegraphic business passing through the Court post-office is very heavy; all telegrams for the King are wired as tliev come in from the central post-office to Buckingham Palace, and arc delivered to the King's private secretary. There are three first-class operators at Buckingham Palace, who are able to lake down despatches in l'reneh and German as well as in English. The bulk of the telegraphic messages for the King are, as a matter of fact, sent in code, and have to be transcribed by the operators with the greatest care, for the least mistake in the working of the transcription might alter the whole meaning of the message. When the King travels anywhere the sovereign's suite always includes the Court postmaster and two assistants, who make arrangements for dealing with the King's mail matter wherever his Majesty may stay. All the Royal residences are fitted with a private postoifice and served with telegraphic and j telephone wires, but when the Sovereign becomes a guest at a private house the King's postmaster has to arrange to have it connected with a temporary wire from the nearest telegraph office. The temporary wire is removed at the end of the King's visit. The telephone department at Buckingham Palace is also under the control of the Court postmaster. There are three operators on duty when the King is in London, all of whom can take messages in French and German as well as in English. His Majesty has certain telephone privileges, by the way, which arc not granted to any other person in the kingdom—not even to the Queen or members of the Royal Family. When a call is made by the King, or on behalf of the King, the required line is at once cleared of all other traffic and the Royal call is put through at once. If the ltoyal call is for a number on sonic London exchange this privilege is of no special service to the Sovereign, for the lines on the London exchanges are cleared very quickly in the ordinary way; but if the King requires to speak to someone in the provinces or on the Continent the privilege is of immense advantage. For example, say the King wanTed to call for "100 Paris Central." Now, there are only four lines between London and Paris, and they are usually requisitioned early ill the day by a number of different persons, chiefly business people in the City. All the calls are put through in the order in which they come in to the Trunk exchange. Thus, supposing at eleven o'clock there were fifty callers waiting their turn, it would be at least two hours before another caller could be put through, for lie would have to wait until the fifty calls that came before bis had been cleared. Hut directly a call from the King comes in. his Majesty is put through as soon as the call in progress is finished. As the time-limit for a call on the Paris line is three minutes, the King is never kept waitinir for a nne at the outside for more than three minutes. There is no time-limit to a Royal call; but the King is aware of the inconvenience it causes to business persons to hold up an important line for any length of

time, and a ltoyal call therefore rarely or never exceeds Lhe normal limit. The organization of the post-office, telegraph and telephone .service at liuckingliain Palace has always been regarded as more perfect than that existing at any other Court in Europe, and the Kaiser has lately adopted the methods existing at the King's post-office in London at the German Court, post-olliee at Potsdam.