Military Post Marks

Introduction

The British Army Post office was extremely efficient. It could deliver mail to men at the front often before a similar letter could be delivered in the United Kingdom. In the reverse direction the need for censorship often slowed down the mail from the time it was written to the time it entered the system. There was a further check to ensure that mail from the front which had been returned because a soldier had been killed was not returned to the writer before the official telegram had been received by the next of kin.

While individual units cannot be identified from the postmarks below the Brigade level, it is generally possible to identify which letters or postcards had come from areas where various units of the Royal Berks had been serving and allied to censor marks, the signature of the censoring officer and the addressee it is often possible to pinpoint the writer.

Mail from the front was often kept for long periods by the families, especially of those who were killed. However as the immediate families have died off much of this material has filtered through to the postal history market and is readily available at stamp and postcard fairs.

In this note we provide some of the clues needed to identify mail with Royal Berks's units.

The Postal System.

It is necessary to first explain the general system whereby mail from the fighting units was handled. There were detailed changes over the years but the description which follows will indicate the main lines of the flow.

When a man had a letter or postcard ready for posting it would be collected from the trenches by a company runner and taken to the company or battalion post box. Most company, battalion, brigade and divisional HQs would also have a mail box into which mail could be placed. The first step was to censor the mail. This was a job usually given to the lowliest subaltern at the relevant HQ and he would either cross out offending material or simply destroy the correspondence. Items that passed the censorship would be given a censor stamp bearing a number and the censor would also have to sign it. Some items of mail did not need the stamp, for example a Field Post Card which the man could complete to say eg that he was well. The mail was then taken by courier to the Brigade HQ where the lowest level of Field Post Offices were located. At these FPOs a clerk of the Army Postal Service would apply a postmark consisting of a double ring with the words FIELD POST OFFICE and a number. Initially the number indicated the Brigade but when British Intelligence reconstructed almost the whole of the German Order of Battle from a consignment of mail captured in early 1916 it was ordered that handstamps had to be changed at regular intervals and this new arrangement started on 18th June 1916. There were six periods referred to as phases I to VI.

Divisional HQs also operated post offices and their postmarks incorporated the letter D to prefix the Divisional number. Corps HQ were indicated by the letter H (as cavalry brigades used the C prefix) There were also train post offices (identified by the letter T). It should be noted that 'train' was an army technical term and related to the logistics service of a Division (in the sense of a baggage train) and not to a railway train, although in some cases a railway formed part of a divisional train. Many other indicators were in use but these need not concern us.

Early in the war a slightly different system was in use. At first an Army Postal Unit would be attached to a Brigade, Division or Corps and used a handstamp bearing the words ARMY POST OFFICE and the number of the postal unit. From 22nd Jan 1915 however there was a need to separate out the fixed post offices (which stayed in the same geographical location) from the mobile ones (which travelled with the fighting units). These latter offices were the ones redesignated Field Post Offices.

The mail flowed from Brigade to Division via the Divisonal train and then to the Division's supply railhead where the Divisional train finished. Here it was placed in a special mail van attached to the back of most trains and taken to an appropriate Base Post Office for sorting. Mail for other units would be returned to the system and mail for the UK would be sent first to Le Havre and then taken via Southampton and entered the GPO system.

This is obviously a gross over-simplification of what was a very complex and sophisticated sytem. Arrangements were similar for other theatres of war and there were slightly different arrangements for parcels and registered mail.

One point to note however was that while in the trenches men often had little or no time to write letters or cards and often no means to write anyway. Many letters from the trenches will be found written in indelible ink from specially produced pencils which had to be moistened before use. These are easily identified from their purple colour.

It was when men were at rest camps or in hospital that they had the most time to write and so a fairly high proportion of surviving correspondence bears the marks of such places rather than the Field Post Offices. Brigade Identification.

The Brigades we will be interested in are those in which a battalion of the Royal Berks was engaged. We will not deal with Divisions or Corps as they were common to so many units. These are:-

Brigade

Battalion

from

to

1

8

7/8/1915

6/2/1918

6

1

5/8/1914

13/12/1915

10

1/4th

30/3/1915

13/5/1915

24

8

24/4/1918

26/4/1918

25

2

5/11/1914

end

35

5

30/5/1915

6/2/1918

36

5

6/2/1918

end

53

6

24/7/1915

6/2/1918

53

8

6/2/1918

end

78

7

27/9/1915

end

99

1

13/12/1915

end

145

1/4th

13/5/1915

end

184

2/4th

2/1915

end

The Postmarks

The postmarks that will be of interest are therefore:-

Identity

Brigade

Batt

from

to

Phase

APO 1

6

1

5/8/14

6/2/15

 

APO 72

25

2

5/11/14

8/2/15

 

FPO 1

1

8

7/8/15

17/6/16

 

FPO 2

35

5

1/7/17

31/1/18

IV

FPO 3

25

2

18/6/16

30/9/16

I

FPO 3

10

1/4th

1/10/16

31/1/17

II

FPO 5

35

5

30/5/15

17/6/16

 

FPO 6

6

1

6/2/15

13/12/15

 

FPO 6

35

5

1/2/18

6/2/18

V

FPO 7

53

6

16/6/16

30/9/16

I

FPO 7

36

5

6/2/18

31/7/18

V

FPO 8

1

8

1/10/16

31/1/17

II

FPO 10

10

1/4th

30/3/15

17/6/16

 

FPO 12

1

8

1/2/17

30/6/17

III

FPO 13

35

5

18/6/16

30/9/16

I

FPO 13

53

8

1/8/18

1/2/19

VI

FPO 20

10

1/4th

1/2/17

30/6/17

III

FPO 20

53

6

1/7/17

31/1/18

IV

FPO 23

1

8

18/6/16

30/9/16

I

FPO 25

25

2

8/2/15

17/6/16

 

FPO 25

53

6

1/2/18

15/2/18

V

FPO 25

53

8

1/2/18

31/7/18

V

FPO 34

1

8

1/7/17

31/1/18

IV

FPO 42

35

5

1/10/16

31/1/17

II

FPO 42

10

1/4th

1/2/18

31/7/18

V

FPO 43

10

1/4th

1/7/17

31/1/18

IV

FPO 44

25

2

1/2/17

30/6/17

III

FPO 46

53

6

1/10/16

31/1/17

II

FPO 50

35

5

1/2/17

30/6/17

III

FPO 50

10

1/4th

1/8/18

1/2/19

VI

FPO 52

24

8

24/4/18

26/4/18

V

FPO 53

53

6

24/7/15

17/6/16

 

FPO 56

10

1/4th

18/6/16

30/9/16

I

FPO 58

25

2

1/7/17

31/1/18

IV

FPO 61

99

1

1/2/18

31/7/18

V

FPO 61

25

2

1/8/18

1/2/19

VI

FPO 68

53

6

1/2/17

30/6/17

III

FPO 78

78

7

27/9/15

1/3/19

Salonika

FPO 92

99

1

1/10/16

31/1/17

II

FPO 99

99

1

13/12/15

17/6/16

 

FPO 111

99

1

1/2/17

30/6/17

III

FPO 112

145

1/4th

1/7/17

10/11/17

IV

FPO 138

145

1/4th

1/10/16

31/1/17

II

FPO 142

184

2/4th

18/6/16

30/9/16

I

FPO 145

145

1/4th

13/5/15

17/6/16

 

FPO 145

145

1/4th

11/11/17

1/3/19

Italy

FPO 166

145

1/4th

18/6/16

30/9/16

I

FPO 177

99

1