Back in 1914, there were no emails, private phone calls or texts, in order to contact someone you would need to right a letter or in extreme circumstances send a telegram. But just how did over 12 million letters reach soldiers in the trenches every week?
AT the outbreak of war, the government came to the conclusion that soldiers writing home each week and receiving letters could be of great comfort and help morale, both in the trenches and at home. For this, the enlisted the help of The Post Office to help establish a plan with which to keep the flow of letters moving.
When letters from home were sent, they had a long way to go to reach the intended person and The Post Office timescale was only two days. For example, a wife sending a letter to her husband "somewhere in France". She would spend hours writing her letter with care, sometimes adding some scent to the paper, to remind her husband of home before posting it. The letter then would need to travel by train to the Head Quarters, using near London, to be censored and the Battalion address known. The letter then travels from the Head Quarters to the Docks to be put on a ship, along with millions other letters, across the Channel to France. The letters would then be sorted again and the censorship checked before it being sent to the correct locations in France. It would then probably need to travel three or four miles through trenches to reach the officer in charge. Then when it was safe to do so, the officer would hand the letters out to his men.
Letters were a great comfort to many people during World War 1. They boosted morale for soldiers by hearing what everyone was getting up to and how children were growing up at home, as well as at home, by making it known that their loved one was still safe for the time being. Writing also became a hobby, wives and mothers could find spend their evenings writing to their loved ones to pass the time they would have normally spent with them. For Soldiers at the front it gave them something to concentrate on in between fighting. Many soldiers sent home buttons and silk scarves bought for the local villages as they passed which could be sent home as presents.
The Army gave a few different options when writing home. A Field Postcard could be sent, which gave multiple choice options pre-written that could be crossed through when not relevant. These included things like "I'm well" or "Sending my love". However a soldier could only sign and date the card, they weren't allowed to write anything else. I would imagine receiving a Field Postcard, although it says that your loved one is safe would come across as being very distant and cold and I think many people would actually wonder if their loved one even knew it had been sent or whether they were just told to sign something.
Another option was to use an Honour Envelop. This was were a soldier signed a declaration to confirm no forbidden information had been disclosed within the letter. This meant that nobody at the front would check the letter such as officers, however, they would still be checked by Postal Workers back in Britain when they arrived.
The final and most popular way was Self Censorship. Many soldiers didn't want to burden their loved ones with the horrors of war, especially if there were children that would read the letter. For many men, to discuss the war with anyone who was not there felt to be disloyal and cowardly. They thought it easier to block out what was truly happening as if it wasn't. These letters still needed to be censored and this was done by the Officer in charge. Many of the officers didn't like reading their men's letters as they felt it an intrusion into their privacy and some even chose not to check their men's letters, so these were sent back unaltered. This was a serious offence and if caught the officer in question would be in trouble with the Army Officials.
The timescale of two days started to fall apart quite early on in the war as more and more letters were sent. You could expect no letters for weeks on end, then suddenly three or four turn up at once. It was very difficult to cross the channel and some boats containing letters were bombed or sunk and so their letters today remain at the bottom of the channel. The people of The Post Office worked tirelessly in order to censor and sort letters as well as deliver them. The are the unsung heroes who didn't complain and are not really talked about even today. Without them, morale would have been low and communication lines would have been cut. Many fathers and grandfathers wouldn't have heard about their children's first words or when they took their first steps, of exam results or of any illnesses or deaths.
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