Inked date stamps were at first called 'Bishops marks' after their inventor, Henry Bishop, Postmaster General, 1660-1663. The post office was receiving complaints about late arrival of the post. Bishop claimed: 'a stamp is invented, that is putt upon every letter shewing the day of the moneth that every letter comes to this office, so that no letter Carryer may dare to detayne a letter from post to post; which, before, was usual.' As we now know, this did not actually solve the problem, just provided more evidence that the problem existed.
This section lists the memorials where the subject on this page is commemorated:
First postmarks in the world
Commemorated ati
General Letter Office
Near this spot the General Letter Office stood in Post House Yard, 1653 - 166...
Other Subjects
Harry Keeble
Worked for the Royal Arsenal Co-operative Society. Was on the building committee for the Abbey Wood branch in 1912.
Sir Joseph Lyons
Sir Joseph Nathaniel Lyons was a pioneer of mass catering. Chairman of J. Lyons and Co. Born Kennington,his father being a Jewish itinerant watch seller. Joseph was apprenticed to an optician. Mov...
Abney Park Cemetery Company
Set up to run the Abney Park cemetery in Stoke Newington (see Abney House and Park), this company also ran the Chingford Mount cemetery. It went into administration in the 1970s.
Thomas Woodward & Sons
Brewers. They took over the Clapham Brewery, changing its name to ‘The Plough’ which was the same as the brewery they had run in Kennington. The railings at the front of the building bear the initi...
Previously viewed
Department for Communities and Local Government
A department of the government of the UK. From Victoria Cross commemorative paving stones: "In August 2013, the UK government announced a campaign to honour Victoria Cross recipients from the First...
Helene "Lenchen" Demuth (or Helena)
Housekeeper for Jenny and Karl Marx. Born Germany. Her date of birth is also sometimes given as 31 December. She was much more than a housekeeper. As a girl she was adopted into Jenny's family ...
Coronation tree - Embankment Gardens
WC2, Victoria Embankment Gardens
There is a third plaque (far right) but it's about some gardening prize which we didn't find sufficiently interesting. During the early p...
Sir Raymond Unwin
Born Whiston, near Rotherham. Architect & town planner. With his partner Barry Parker he designed Letchworth Garden City in 1903 and Hampstead Garden Suburb in 1907. Died in Connecticut, where ...
Comments are provided by Facebook, please ensure you are signed in here to see them