Fifty years ago, in the spring of 1971, long before the advent of cell phones, emails, and text messaging, the country’s communications were threatened with chaos when postal workers voted for a nationwide strike.
Unable to negotiate a salary agreement with the Post Office, members of the Union of Post Office Workers set down envelopes, packages and everything else and went outside, completely disrupting most of the UK postal services.
Fortunately, a group of rather unlikely heroes appeared in South Worcestershire. Stamp collectors aren’t exactly known for their good deeds, but by 71 the members of the recently formed Evesham and District Philatelic and Postcard Society – conveniently abbreviated to Evesham Stamp Club – became legends.
When the strike was due to start on January 20th, they got together and decided to set up their own post office so that local citizens and businesses would not suffer too much.
Andrew Watton, a committee member, stated, “We obtained written approval for the service from Worcester PO and then decided to go to our Secretary Ricky Hyde’s home at 23 Mill Street in Evesham, where Ricky’s wife Rose volunteered to attend Help organize the business.
“An amateur press was set up and Ricky did proofs of a 6D stamp design. An imperforate white square of paper with a self-adhesive back and red lettering was agreed and a first edition of 120 sheets of 4 x 6d postage stamps was printed.
“Then a small run of 6d and 2s postage stamps was printed and sold at face value, but demand soon demanded reprints. Additional prints were made for 1 and 4 stamps.
Susan Barnard and Ricky Hale frank outbound mail
“A special sheet for the Broadway Strike Post label in sheets of 10 was printed in two colors. The entire delivery and collection process was led by Susan Barnard, who worked on Bridge Street in Evesham but lived on Broadway. A handout / flyer promoting the service was created and the club members hand delivered it to Evesham’s mailboxes and on January 22nd we went into action.
“The original intention was to only serve Evesham and the surrounding villages, but contact with Parker Post (an independent national service) in Worcester, which already had connections to a wider area, including London, resulted in us too connected to this service. ”
Club chairman Alan Ward brings a wad of letters to Worcester
On the first day of business – January 22, 1971 – they had 50 letters, a very encouraging start to the ESC’s “Beat the Strike” idea. These were stamped with a blue or black date stamp and, like most for local delivery, were delivered personally by the members, although a small number were for more distant destinations such as Birmingham and London.
This led to a review of fees as there was a cost to the removal so adding 4’s worth of stamps for Birmingham and 7’s for London.
The interest of philatelists who were looking for “First Day Covers” quickly arose, and these were prepared with 6d postage stamps and marked “FIRST ISSUE DAY / Evesham / 22 JANUARY 1971” on the envelope.
A changed leaflet was sent out about the revised delivery service to locations such as Malvern, Stratford, Cheltenham, Gloucester, Hereford, Birmingham and London and the associated fees.
Examples of Evesham Stamp Club expenses
Unfortunately, the day of decimalization came during the strike, which led to an overhaul of the system. A special stamp design “DECIMAL DAY / Evesham / February 15, 1971” was developed and only used on that day. This was accompanied by printing new decimal output marks in 2½p, 5p, 10p, and 20p values for later use. At the end of the March 8th strike, Mill Street ceased operations and any undelivered mail was sent to the Evesham Post Office for postage and delivery.
Andrew added: “Initially the main objective was to provide a postal service for Evesham and the surrounding villages and this has no doubt been achieved.
In total, more than 3,000 mail items and a total of over 14,000 postage stamps were printed in the six operating weeks. Second, but no less important, was to promote the Evesham Stamp Club and generate interest in its activities and maybe get a few new members, which was also seen as a success. ”
Another good news: if you’ve hidden any of these Spring 1971 specialty stamps somewhere, they could be worth anywhere from £ 5 to £ 10 each.