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CORNELL 
 
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Cornell University Library 
 HE6475 .C31 
 
 The railway mail service, its origin and 
 
 olin 
 
 3 1924 030 137 735 
 
Cornell University 
 Library 
 
 The original of tliis book is in 
 tlie Cornell University Library. 
 
 There are no known copyright restrictions in 
 the United States on the use of the text. 
 
 http://www.archive.org/details/cu31924030137735 
 
THE RAILWAY MAIL SERVICE 
 
By CLARK E. CARR 
 
 The Illini: A Story of the Prairies. 
 With many portraits. Seventh 
 edition. Indexed. 8vo, $2.00 net. 
 
 Lincoln at Gettysburg. With por- 
 traits, facsimiles, and map. Fourth 
 edition. Indexed. \(xa.o,%i.oonet. 
 
 My Day and Generation. With 
 over 60 illustrations. Indexed. 
 Large 8vo, $3.00 net. 
 
 A. C. McCLURG & CO., Publishers 
 CHICAGO 
 
HON. GEORGE B. ARMSTRONG 
 Founder of the Postal Railway 
 
THE 
 
 Railway Mail Service 
 
 ITS ORIGIN AND DEVELOPMENT 
 
 BY 
 
 CLARK E. CARR 
 
 Adthor of " The Illini," " My Day and Generation," 
 AND " Lincoln at Gettysburg " 
 
 CHICAGO 
 
 A. C. McCLURG & CO. 
 
 1909 
 
^7) 
 
 iS:-:^i 
 
 . DONNELLEY & SONS COMPANY 
 CHICAGO 
 
JUST A WORD 
 
 "T^HE author of this little book entered the postal 
 -■- service of the United States in April, 1861, upon 
 the accession of the Republican party, and remained 
 in the service almost a quarter of a century. During 
 that time the postal railway service was conceived 
 and inaugurated and brought to a high state of 
 efl&ciency. 
 
 My ofl&cial duties brought me into intimate 
 personal relations with Mr. George B. Armstrong, 
 who founded the service, with Mr. George S. Bangs, 
 who established and put into operation the fast 
 mail, and Captain James E. White, who has brought 
 the whole system into its present state of perfection. 
 
 The account presented in this book appeared 
 substantially in the same form in my recent volume 
 of recollections, "My Day and Generation." I 
 have tried to make the article of interest to the 
 general public, but I have also had especially in 
 mind its appeal to the great army of faithful and 
 efl&cient postal railway clerks, who, night and day, 
 in darkness and sunshine, through storm and flood, 
 are traversing this vast continent, so distributing 
 our mail that it may reach its destination in the 
 shortest time possible. 
 
 That I did not underestimate this appeal has 
 been shown- by the wide number of inquiries made 
 
Just a Word 
 
 of my publishers for copies of the article in booklet 
 form, and it is in answer to these inquiries that the 
 material is now republished in a form that should 
 place it within the reach of every postal clerk in the 
 United States. 
 
 Clark E. Carr. 
 
 Gaiesburg, Illinois, 
 Jamuiry 22, igog. 
 
ILLUSTRATIONS 
 
 Portrait of George B. Armstrong . Frontispiece 
 
 Portrait of Hon. W. H. Eddy . . . .4 
 
 Bronze Tablet on Shaft over the Grave of 
 George B. Armstrong 16 
 
 The First Railway Post-office Car, showing 
 Paper and Letter Cases 18 
 
 Portrait of George S. Bangs 22 
 
 The Sweat Case 28 
 
 The Fast Mail 32 
 
 Portrait of James E. White 36 
 
 Portrait of Alexander Grant .... 42 
 
THE RAILWAY MAIL 
 SERVICE 
 
 I KNOW no more striking way to illustrate the 
 improvements in the railway mail service, than 
 to give, first, an accoxmt of the appointment and ser- 
 vice of "Hoss Eddy." 
 
 The Hon. W. H. Eddy, whom I knew well, was 
 long one of the best informed men in Chicago. Of 
 much more than ordinary ability, he was, when I 
 knew him, a powerful man politically. A Republi- 
 can, really an abolitionist, if any one wished to 
 carry the city either in a party caucus or in an elec- 
 tion, it was important to have his support. His 
 business for many years was connected with horses, 
 sale stables, livery stables, and the like, and hence 
 notwithstanding his ability and political promi- 
 nence, he acquired the sobriquet of "Hoss Eddy," 
 which he was never able to shake off. Like many 
 another Chicago politician of that day, he was a 
 speculator, sometimes on the high road to pros- 
 
The Railway Mail Service 
 
 parity, sometimes poor; but always full of humor, 
 brilliant, and companionable. At different times 
 he owned for his stables some of what is now the 
 most valuable property in the city. He lived to 
 see property he had bought for a few hundred 
 dollars worth millions. 
 
 At a time when fortime was frowning upon Mr. 
 Eddy, when, as he said, he was "in Valley Forge," 
 the Hon. I. N. Arnold, then a member of Congress 
 from Chicago, had him appointed mail agent between 
 Chicago and Burlington, a position which was 
 duly accepted. 
 
 Already past middle life, it was beyond possibility 
 for Eddy to master the details of the service. He 
 was conscientious and worked hard, but he could 
 not get his mail separated and ready to put off at 
 the proper stations. In his haste, he made so 
 many mistakes that the mails were out of joint all 
 along the line. His struggles to succeed became 
 pitiful. Never was there such demoralization of 
 the mails; and never were there so many com- 
 plaints. The profanity of the traditional army 
 in Flanders was nothing compared with that along 
 the line of the Burlington Railway. 
 
 Finally, one day, just as the train stopped at 
 Altona, a farmer with a superb span of horses drove 
 up beside the mail car and stopped to ask a question. 
 
The Railway Mail Service 
 
 Eddy, coatless and hatless, with his mail key dangling 
 at his side, jumped out of his car and began a 
 searching examination of the team. While engaged 
 m this, the train started. Away it went, unobserved 
 by him, until too late to catch on. Realizing that 
 this was the last straw, he telegraphed his resigna- 
 tion, bought the team of horses, and that night was 
 on his way to Chicago with them. After driving 
 them long enough to accustom them to the city, 
 he sold them to Mr. Potter Palmer, reahzing, in clear 
 profit, more than a mail agent's salary for a year. 
 
 Long after, when fortune had smiled upon him 
 again, it was amusing to hear Mr. Eddy tell of his 
 career as a mail agent. "Mine was the fairest dis- 
 tribution of mail ever made," I heard him declare in 
 presence of George S. Bangs, who enjoyed the joke 
 beyond measure: "Bangs was post-master at Aurora 
 and I was working under his direction, so I did just 
 as he told me to do. As the mail came into the car I 
 piled it all upon the big table, and when the locomo- 
 tive whistled for a station I looked out of the window 
 to see how big a town we were going into and then 
 poked into a mail bag what I thought was that 
 town's share and put it off. For instance, Riverside 
 is small, and I gave them about half a peck; Dow- 
 ner's Grove larger, and I gave them a peck; Hins- 
 dale about the same; and when I looked out and 
 
 3 
 
The Railway Mail Service 
 
 saw Aurora, big as it is, I gave them a full bushel. 
 It 's the fairest way ever devised, for each town got 
 her share. Still they grumbled and began putting 
 the mail back onto me. Finally, when they foimd 
 that I knew my rights and had political backing, 
 they went and gave their mail to the agent who ran 
 on the train opposite to me, and I got rid of it. It 's 
 so hard to make people appreciate their blessings. 
 They're grumbling yet." 
 
 Eddy told his story with a straight face, and 
 there was enough truth in it to make him remembered 
 by every old postal official on the Burlington system. 
 Even now a complaint of miscarriage of letters at 
 a post-office window is often answered by the declara- 
 tion that "'Hoss Eddy' must be running again." 
 
 At that time there was only a single mail agent 
 in charge of the mail upon a train. He seldom 
 had a car by himself, but only a compartment in a 
 car. Cars in those days were divided into two, or 
 sometimes three, compartments — one for mail, 
 another for baggage, and a third for express business. 
 Usually the only mails he distributed were those 
 for the towns on his line. There was no night ser- 
 vice. On the great Western lines, as from Chicago 
 to Omaha, a mail agent ran each way during the 
 day, giving service along the line daily from each 
 direction. The towns along a line neither received 
 
 4 
 
HON. W. H, EDDY 
 
The Railway Mail Service 
 
 nor sent out mail at night, except in a through bag 
 for a great population centre like Chicago. This 
 bag was thrown into the baggage car on the night 
 train and lay there until delivered. 
 
 In order to facilitate the distribution of mail, 
 certain large post-ofl&ces centrally situated were 
 designated as "distributing post-ofl&ces," to which 
 mail was sent in packages. For instance, we at 
 Galesburg would bimch all the letters we received 
 for Wisconsin and Michigan in one parcel and direct 
 the parcel, "Chicago D. P. O." (Distributmg Post 
 Ofl&ce), all letters for Indiana to Indianapolis 
 D. P. O., for New England and the East to Boston, 
 Albany, New York, or Philadelphia D. P. O. At 
 these distributing post-ofl&ces letters were necessarily 
 detained for sorting and distribution, frequently for | 
 twenty-four jiours. 
 
 A system of billing aU letters had been in vogue 
 from the beginning of the service, probably inaug- 
 urated by Benjamin Franklin, which required 
 that every package of letters for every town, big and 
 little, should be done up with a bill of the letters it 
 contained and wrapped in brown paper furnished 
 by the Department, and the parcel so done up 
 directed to its destination, where it was opened and 
 the letters sorted for delivery. This took much 
 time and frequently caused delay. Under the 
 
 5 
 
The Railway Mail Service 
 
 direction and advice of a practical post-office man 
 of whom we shall speak, this system of billing and 
 wrapping was abandoned, and all the letters des- 
 tined to a particular ofl&ce were simply tied together 
 in a bimch with a plainly directed letter on the out- 
 side, and this, with a single handling, went to its 
 destination. 
 
 When Mr. Lincoln came into ofl&ce the Democratic 
 offi cials, holding pract icall y all the positions, were 
 removed, and Republicans appointed to their places. 
 Experien ce_aJi d aptitude were not essential to an 
 appointment, it being required only that a candi- 
 date was ordi narily intelligent, and a Republ ican. 
 These appointments were left to the Senators and 
 members of Congress, and their recommendation 
 was sufficient to insure the appointment. It was 
 under this system that "Hoss Eddy" was given 
 his place. 
 
 I__was appoi nted post-master at G alesb urg in 
 April, i86i. I knew nothing of the postal servic e. 
 It had been the same with all m y predecessors. 
 As was the case with every appointment made in 
 those days, the appointee was expected to learn the 
 duties of the position after entering upon it. I_was 
 fortunate in finding in t h e office a c lerk e xpert jnjiis 
 duties^and I retained him. 
 
 John L. Scripps, then one of the proprietors of 
 6 
 
The Railway Mail Service 
 
 the Chicago Tribune, an able emd worthy man, 
 was appointed post-master at Chicago about the 
 same time. I frequently visited the Chicago office 
 for the purpose of informing myself in my duties, 
 and found that, able as he was, Mr. Scripps knew 
 no more of the duties of a post-master than I. 
 
 GEORGE B. ARMSTRONG 
 
 I found, however, that Mi\_Sc^pshadan^ssi^^ 
 post-master, George B. Armstr ong , who had been 
 in that posit ion in that office for se veral years and 
 whq_rga lly understood th e business of the office. 
 He proved to be the most efficient, practical, and 
 intelligent post-office official I had ever seen. He 
 was polite and kind to me, and assisted me greatly 
 by his instructions. 
 
 Mr. Armstrong was then in his prime, just entering 
 upon his fortieth year. He was of medium height, 
 good figure, elastic in his movements, had auburn 
 hair and a fair complexion, and was the picture of 
 health. He was frank, open, and earnest in expres- 
 sion, and enthusiastic in everything he undertook, 
 especially in matters pertaining to postal affairs. 
 He had a lisp pronounced enough to characterize 
 his speech, without at all interfering with his pro- 
 nunciation or being in the least disagreeable. He 
 was familiar with every detail of the workings of 
 
 7 
 
The Railway Mail Service 
 
 the Chicago post-ofl5ce, and knew everything in 
 every department, from the sorting and distribution 
 of mail to a complete mastery of all the accoxmts. 
 He understood every postal route out of Chicago, 
 and knew just where to throw every letter to insure 
 its reaching its destination in the shortest time. 
 Withal he delighted in instructing and assisting 
 every postal ofl&cial to such familiarity with his 
 duties as would bring the best results for the service. 
 He brought the Chicago office up to the highest 
 standard; not only that, but he greatly contributed 
 toward bringing other post-ofl&ces up to his own 
 high standard. 
 
 My first interview with Armstrong taught me 
 the advantage of his suggestions and advice, and 
 I availed myself of them whenever I had the oppor- 
 timity. 
 
 The Chicago post-office under his manage- 
 ment — he had then served as assistant post-master 
 under different administrations for several years — 
 seemed as nearly perfect as possible. Upon so 
 declaring to Mr. Armstrong, I found that he regarded 
 it as far from perfect — that he could see many 
 ways in which the system in vogue could be im- 
 proved. Like all progressive men who achieve 
 results, one point of attainment served to place 
 him in a position where he could see still higher 
 
 8 
 
The Railway Mail Service 
 
 and more worthy objects of achievement beyond; 
 so he was constantly planning and working to 
 cure the defects in the postal service and, by adopt- 
 ing new methods, to add to its efl&ciency. No 
 one, not then connected with the service, can realize 
 what a saving it has been in time and labor to dis- 
 pense with the unnecessary system of billing and 
 wrapping letters. One of the first reforms Mr. 
 Armstrong suggested in his talks with me was that 
 this be abandoned. He worked at this until it 
 was accomplished. 
 
 I found that I was not the only new postal offi- 
 cial who had the advantage of Mr. Armstrong's 
 experience and guidance. In the general sweep of 
 putting out Demo cr ats and putting in Re pubU- 
 cans, the other new post-office officials were no 
 better info rmed of the duties of their positions 
 than I. This was true not only of post-masters 
 and t heir deputies, but also of special agents of 
 the department, and the mail agents on the rail- 
 ways. 
 
 When thus sitting at Mr. Armstrong's feet, I was 
 brought into contact with other new appointees in 
 the postal service. Among these were the Hon. 
 E. W. Keyes, post-master at Madison, Wisconsin, 
 and the Hon. George S. Bangs, post-master at 
 Aurora, Illinois. We became imbued with Mr. Arm- 
 
 9 
 
The Railway Mail Service 
 
 strong's enthusiasm, took great interest in his plans 
 for improving the service, and assisted him so far 
 as we could in influencing Mr. Lincoln's administra- 
 tion, especially the post-office department, to adopt 
 his recommendations. Mr. Keyes was potential in 
 Wisconsin politics and was able to give Mr. Arm- 
 strong an endorsement by a resolution of the legis- 
 lature of that State. Mr. Bangs finally became one 
 of the ablest officials of the postal railway service. 
 
 The new officials of the post-office department 
 had hardly become settled in their positions when 
 the Civil War came. In the glamour of raising 
 and equipping armies and sending them to the field 
 many achievements as necessary and essential as 
 arms and ammunition and drill do not appear. 
 Without food, shelter, clothing, and transportation, 
 an army, like an individual, must succumb. But 
 one of the most important elements in keeping up 
 the morale of an army made up of Americans lies in 
 the mails. Letters from home, from parents, from 
 brothers and sisters, wives and sweethearts, are 
 a constant means of encouragement to the American 
 soldier, and nerve him to heroic deeds; while writing 
 letters home is the greatest of consolations to him. 
 They maintain in his heart the throb of patriotism 
 which animates the whole nation. 
 
 In i860 the Hon. David T. Linnegar, a Republi- 
 10 
 
The Railway Mail Service 
 
 can of southern Illinois, not then a resident of Cairo, 
 consented to become the Republican candidate for 
 Congress against John A. Logan, the Democratic 
 candidate, in the district known as Lower 'Egypt, to 
 give strength to the State and National ticket. Mr. 
 Linnegar made a gallant fight with no possibility of 
 election, Logan defeating him by a majority of about 
 eighteen thousand. But he broug ht out the Republi- 
 can vote which otherwise might have stayed at home, 
 a nd this was also cast for the Stat e and Nation al 
 Republican ti ckets, wh ere it wa s needed . 
 
 As a recognition of his services in this regard 
 President Lincoln made Mr. Lin negar post-master 
 at Cairo. H e kne w no more of th e duties of the 
 o ffice than w e in northe rn Illinois, besides he had 
 no Armstrong to teach him. The office was small 
 and the business light, — as I remember he had 
 three clerks. Suddenly, within forty-eight hours, 
 the Cairo post-office, one of the smallest in the 
 United States, became one of the greatest. Mail 
 bags were thrown in by the hundred and by the 
 thousand, filling up the rooms, projecting out of the 
 windows, and piled up on the platforms. The 
 western Union army had come to occupy Cairo 
 and the region roimd about. I myself was there 
 and saw the appalling congestion of mails. This 
 was in the Spring of 1862. 
 
 II 
 
The Railway Mail Service 
 
 Poor Linnegar, entirely bewildered, could do noth- 
 ing but telegraph the Postmaster-General at Wash- 
 ington for help. A few post-ofl&ce clerks, detailed 
 from the cities, were taken to Cairo, but they could 
 do nothing without an effective head. It was a 
 matter of surprise and gratification when George B. 
 Armstrong appeared. Never was such a man more 
 needed, and never was a man better equipped for 
 such an emergency. 
 
 The first thing to do was to provide room in which 
 to work, and then to improvise sorting and distrib- 
 uting tables, racks, and cases, so that several 
 men could work efficiently. This was done in an 
 incredibly short time. The mail bags were opened, 
 the mail carefully sorted, the bags refilled and 
 tagged for the command, the divisions, the brigades, 
 or regiments, or the post-ofl&ce at home, where the 
 mail placed in them belonged. These bags were 
 sent out to the army and away upon the railways 
 until the congestion was relieved. The great piles 
 of mail bags grew less and less as if by magic, imtil 
 they disappeared altogether, and the clerks had then 
 only to take care of the mail as it came in upon the 
 trains and from the army. Of course, the business 
 of the ofi5ce continued to be enormous, but soon, 
 with the extra number of clerks allowed him, Post- 
 master Linnegar was able to conduct the business 
 
The Railway Mail Service 
 
 satisfactorily, and Mr. Armstrong returned to his 
 
 duties in the Chicago post-ofl&ce. So great was the 
 
 appreciation of Mr. Armstrong's services by the clerks 
 
 in the Cairo oflBce that they presented him with a 
 
 valuable watch, bearing upon the case the following 
 
 inscription: 
 
 Presented to 
 
 GEORGE B. ARMSTRONG 
 
 for his wife 
 
 By clerks of the Cairo Post Office 
 
 as a token of their 
 
 appreciation of his labors 
 
 in organizing that office 
 
 May 28th, 1862 
 
 When Mr. Armstrong first imfolded to me his 
 plans for establishing the postal railway service, or 
 what he called "putting the post-ofl5ces on wheels," I 
 do not remember. Colonel Francis A. Eastman, a 
 neighbor and friend of Mr. Armstrong's and afterward 
 post-master at Chicago, stated that Mr. Armstrong 
 first imfolded his plans to him in 1861. I cannot 
 say that he spoke to me upon the subject so early 
 as that, but I remember distinctly that for a long 
 time before he officially recommended the system 
 to the department, his mind was engrossed with it. 
 I think that he spoke to me concerning it at about 
 the time he unfolded his plans to Mr. Keyes and Mr. 
 Bangs. So interested was he in the matter that he 
 
 13 
 
The Railway Mail Service 
 
 could talk of little else. Like other pioneers in in- 
 vention and discovery whose achievements have 
 proved blessings to mankind, he was absorbed in 
 his subject, and ever3^hing else was to him com- 
 paratively trivial. 
 
 He would no doubt have induced the department 
 to make a test of his plans much earlier, but for the 
 Civil War. He impatiently waited until the Summer 
 of 1864, when he addressed three letters to the Third 
 Assistant Postmaster-General, following closely 
 upon each other, dated May 10, May 14, and June 
 10, respectively. 
 
 To illustrate the character of these letters it 
 is only necessary to quote from one, as follows: 
 
 Letters deposited in a post-office at the latest 
 moment of the departure of the mail from the oflSce 
 for near or distant places should travel with the same 
 uninterrupted speed and certainty as passengers to 
 their places of destination. . . . Passengers 
 travelling over railroad routes generally reach a 
 given point in advance of letters, when to that given 
 .point letters must pass, under the present system, 
 through a distributing office, and when letters are 
 subject to a distributing process in more than one 
 distributing office as is largely the case now, the 
 tardiness of a letter's progress toward its place of 
 destination is proportionately increased. But a 
 general system of railway distribution obviates this 
 difficulty. The work being done while the cars are 
 in motion and transfers of mails from route to 
 
 14 
 
The Railway Mail Service 
 
 route and for local delivery on the way, as they are 
 reached, letters attain the same celerity in transit 
 as persons making direct connections. 
 
 The Hon. A. N. Zevely, the Third Assistant 
 Postmaster-General, to whom these letters were sent, 
 was an enterprising official and thought Mr. Arm- 
 strong's plans should be given a fair trial. The 
 Hon. Montgomery Blair was then Postmaster- 
 General in Mr. Lincoln's cabinet, and Mr. Zevely 
 laid Mr. Armstrong's recommendations before him. 
 Others to whom Mr. Armstrong had outlined his 
 plans orally and in writing recommended the trial. 
 Among these were Mr. Keyes and Mr. Bangs, already 
 mentioned, and the writer. One of those who took 
 up the matter with enthusiasm was the Hon. Schuyler 
 Colfax, then Speaker of the House of Representatives. 
 
 Postmaster-General Blair was induced to give 
 the plan a trial and authorized it be done. The 
 following is a copy of his letter of instruction to 
 Mr. Armstrong: 
 
 Post Office Department, 
 
 July ist, 1864. 
 
 Sir: — You are authorized to test by actual 
 experiment, upon such raihoad route, or routes, as 
 you may select at Chicago, the plans proposed by 
 you for simplifying the mail service. You will 
 arrange with railroad companies to furnish suitable 
 cars for travelling post-offices; designate head 
 offices with their dependent offices; prepare forms 
 
 IS 
 
The Railway Mail Service 
 
 of blanks and instructions for all such oflBces, and 
 those on the railroad not head offices, also for clerks 
 of travelling post-offices. 
 
 To aid you in this work, you may select some 
 suitable route agent whose place can be supplied 
 with a substitute, at the expense of the department. 
 
 When your arrangements are complete, you 
 will report them in full. 
 
 M. Blair, 
 Postmaster-General. 
 
 The first^ ailway post-office in the U nited States 
 was established by M r. Armstrong under the above 
 instructions on August 28, 1864, on the Chicago & 
 North- Weste rn Rai lway. It ran between Chicago , 
 Illinois, and Clinton, Iowa, in a compartment car. 
 The first complete railway post-ofi5ce c ars were 
 built by the same r ailway from plans furnished by 
 Mr. A rmstron g_in 1867, and placed in service 
 between Boone and Council Bluflfs, Iowa. The 
 overland mail to the Pacific coast then went by the 
 Chicago &. North-Westem Railway, upon which 
 those towns were situated, and these cars were run 
 to provide for the immediate despatch westward, 
 of that great mail upon its arrival at the Missouri 
 River, instead of lying over at a distributing post- 
 office as had been necessary up to that time. By 
 this arrangement mails were ascending the Rocky 
 Mountains, five hundred miles west, at a time when 
 they otherwise would have been leaving Omaha. 
 
 16 
 
BRONZE TABLET ON SHAFT OVER THE GRAVE OF 
 GEORGE B. ARMSTRONG 
 
The Railway Mail Service 
 
 The advantages of the new system were so imme- 
 diately apparent that it was speedily established 
 upon other railways, the Chicago, Burlington & 
 Quincy between Chicago and Quincy, and the 
 Chicago & Rock Island. It was soon after put in 
 operation upon the Pennsylvania, the Erie, on 
 roads between New York and Washington, and thus 
 gradually extended to all important Eastern railways. 
 
 In inaugurating this system Mr. Armstrong had 
 availed himself of the services of capable post-office 
 railway men, who had served under the old route 
 agent system. Among these were Harrison Park, 
 James E. White, afterwards himself general superin- 
 tendent of the railway mail service, James E. Stuart, 
 one of the most efficient postal officials in the 
 country and still in the service, and, later, Captain 
 M. J. McGrath. It is impossible for me to men- 
 tion all the able men who contributed toward putting 
 the system into practical operation. Those I have 
 named I knew intimately. 
 
 The postal railway system soon extended to all 
 the leading railways of the country, and it became 
 so enormous that it was necessary to establish it as 
 an office of the department. The country was 
 divided into six divisions, with a superintendent 
 over each, all under the direction of a general super- 
 intendent of the postal railway service. This was 
 
 17 
 
The Railway Mail Service 
 
 done in 1869. No one but George B. Armstrong 
 was considered for the position of General Superin- 
 tendent. He was called to Washington and placed 
 in supreme control over all those divisions. The 
 rapidity of the growth of the railway mail service, 
 and the efficiency to which it attained, made one 
 of the marvels of the age. 
 
 Under the old route agent system one agent in a 
 narrow compartment of a car received and distrib- 
 uted the mail from town to town, delivering such as 
 he received for local ofl&ces, and pouching the re- 
 mainder on his terminal office. If a distributing 
 office intervened, the locked pouches were despatched, 
 like so much dead freight, by star routes and pas- 
 senger trains, sometimes to be delayed a day and 
 sometimes several days, to be sorted or redistributed 
 and pouched for a further journey. 
 
 Under the new system created by the magic of 
 Mr. Armstrong's genius, important trains on trunk 
 lines were equipped with full postal cars, manned 
 by crews of competent clerks, who opened the 
 locked pouches and tie sacks and distributed all the 
 mail while the train was speeding on its way, besides 
 receiving and delivering mail at the towns through 
 which the train passed. Upon arrival at the end of 
 the run, the mail, properly sorted and pouched, was 
 delivered without delay to a connecting line or lines 
 
 18 
 
THE FIRST RAILWAY POST-OFFICE CAR 
 Showing Paper and Letter Cases 
 
The Railway Mail Service 
 
 equipped with similar cars, provided with their com- 
 plement of clerks, to be again distributed, with other 
 mail received, while the train thundered on to its 
 destination. 
 
 This was actually accomplished within five years 
 from the time when the Postmaster-General author- 
 ized Mr. Armstrong to "test by actual experiment" 
 the plans he had proposed. 
 
 There has been manifested a certain disposition 
 to tate from George B. Armstrong the laurels he so 
 richly earned in establishing and putting into 
 practical operation the railway mail service. There 
 can be no doubt that " for years previous to i860 
 there had been s o me distribution of mails on rail- 
 ways." The claim was put forth in one quarter 
 that the railway mail system originated in February, 
 1862, within the lines of the Army of the Tennessee. 
 There can be no reasonable doubt that "the 
 handling of through mail on the cars without turning 
 itjnt o distributing oflSces began in a small way w ith 
 respect to the overland ma ils onl y, under the supe r- 
 intgnde ncy of William A . Davis, in July. 1862^' ' 
 But these were transient, temporary, sporadic move- 
 ments to meet emergencies . Mr. Armstrong conceived 
 and put into execution a complete, continuous, 
 consecutive system, applicable to all the railways of 
 the United States, which entirely revolutionized the 
 
 19 
 
The Railway Mail Service 
 
 manner of distributing and forwarding mail, made 
 mail cars post-offices on wheels, and transferred 
 mail from an incoming to an outgoing train to con- 
 tinue on toward its destination without a moment's 
 delay. 
 
 Had the system been inaugurated in 1862, as has 
 been asserted, Postmaster-General Blair, in the 
 official order directing him to proceed with his 
 plans, would scarcely have said to Mr. Armstrong 
 in 1864, "You are authorized to test upon such 
 railroad route or routes as you may select at Chicago 
 the plans proposed by you for simplifying the mail 
 service." * 
 
 Curiously, at the very time when Mr. Armstrong 
 was beginning to test by actual experiment his plans 
 for "putting post-offices on wheels," a railway car 
 was invented and began to be introduced, which has. 
 contributed perhaps more than an5^hing else to the 
 comfort and convenience of railway travel. 
 , It was in the same year, 1864, that George M. 
 Pulhnan i n and abo ut Chicago began to build and put 
 into operati on his sleeping cars. It is hardly pos- 
 sible to overestimate the advantages of Mr. Pullman's 
 invention. In one of them the traveller can con- 
 tinue his journey indefinitely without fatigue. He 
 can devote himself assiduously to business all day, 
 
 * The Italics are mine. 
 
 20 
 
The Railway Mail Service 
 
 when weary and worn lie down in a comfortable bed 
 at night, to wake up refreshed in another city hun- 
 dreds of miles away in the morning, and ready for 
 work there. He can traverse the entire continent 
 without losing an hour of his usual sleep. If one 
 could estimate the time saved for work and business 
 by these sleeping cars he would find that they have 
 added enormously to the wealth of the country and 
 of the world. Surely George M. Pullman was one of 
 the world's benefactors. 
 
 For his invention, as has been the case with many 
 others, Mr. Pullman was rewarded. He amassed a 
 great fortune. It is entirely proper and just that, 
 through patents, those who have added to the 
 wealth of the coimtry and to the comforts of life 
 should be able to reap substantial reward. 
 
 Mr. Armstrong no doubt devoted as much thought 
 to the conception and inauguration of the postal 
 railway system and to the building and equipment 
 of the postal railway cars as did Mr. Pullman to the 
 conception and inauguration and building of sleeping 
 cars, but Mr. Armstrong was merely a government 
 oflScial and could receive no compensation or emolu- 
 ments from the great system he inaugurated other 
 than the salary he earned, which was expended in 
 the support of himself and family. 
 
 On May 3, 1871, after serving for a little more 
 21 
 
The Railway Mail Service 
 
 than two years as general superintendent of the postal 
 railway service, George B. Armstrong resigned be- 
 cause of failing health. He had been able, how- 
 ever, to complete the organization of the system, and 
 lived to see it generally established throughout the 
 country. He died in Chicago on May 5, 187 1, 
 only two days after his resignation. 
 
 GEORGE S. BANGS 
 
 Geo rge B. Armstrong fo unded and inaugurated 
 the postal railway se rvice, and George~S. Bangs 
 founded and inaugurated the Fast Mail. The Fast 
 Mail was necessary to bring the postal railway 
 service to its highest standard of efl&ciency. But 
 for the postal railway service — facilities for sep- 
 arating and distributing mail on the cars while in 
 motion — the Fast Mail would have been impos- 
 sible. 
 
 George S. Bangs was among Mr. Lincoln's first 
 appointees. He was first made post-master at 
 Aurora. Of striking personality, he was one of the 
 most forceful men it has ever been my good fortune 
 to know. He was courageous, energetic, determined, 
 and at the same time frank and openhearted. He 
 had a commanding influence in politics, and was 
 able to get what he wanted. Instead of Senators 
 and members of Congress dominating him, they 
 
 22 
 
^p 
 
 
 ^^^^l^'^'v 
 
 i^H^; ^^^^SB^^H^H 
 
 ^■^l^ 
 
 nni 
 
 ^^Ht^K3 
 
 |^H^^?^^^^H 
 
 ■ ^Y 
 
 ■p 
 
 L^ 
 
 •VI j^^^Bj 
 
 Who :Inaugurated the Fast Mail 
 
The Railway Mail Service 
 
 were alwajrs glad to get his suggestions, and did not 
 hesitate to follow them. Strong as he appeared, 
 there always seemed to be behind him a reserved 
 force which must carry everything before it. He 
 was prompt, quick to decide, and alert to act, but 
 just, and if he made a mistake, ready to rectify it. 
 Withal he had the ability and earnestness to arouse 
 men to his own enthusiasm. 
 
 In the position of post-master at Aurora, Mr. 
 Bangs soon found it to be greatly to his advantage, 
 as did I and other new post-masters, to know and 
 be instructed by George B. Armstrong. As Mr. 
 Bangs studied the workings of the service, he came 
 to realize its importance as did no other man I have 
 ever met. He regarded the delay of a letter as a 
 crime. He declared that delays in the transporta- 
 tion and delivery of letters caused untold evils, 
 bankruptcy, suicide, estrangement, crimes innumer- 
 able, and despair. He spent much time with Mr. 
 Armstrong in the Chicago office while post-master at 
 Aurora, and Armstrong found him an apt scholar. 
 
 When Mr. Armstrong was summoned to Wash- 
 ington to become general superintendent of the rail- 
 way mail service, so high was his appreciation of Mr. 
 Bangs that he made him assistant superintendent at 
 Chicago, April 4, 1869. Bangs's division consisted of 
 Illinois, Iowa, Missouri, Arkansas, Minnesota, Wis- 
 
 23 
 
The Railway Mail Service 
 
 consin, and the upper peninsula of Michigan. He 
 administered the service in his division with such 
 consummate ability that, upon Mr. Armstrong's re- 
 tirement, May 3, 1871, he was summoned to Wash- 
 ington to succeed him as general superintendent. 
 Mr. Armstrong had created the vast system — had, 
 so to speak, builded the mighty machine, and 
 put it in working order. It remained for Mr. Bangs, 
 his follower and pupil, to bring it to the highest 
 efl&ciency. 
 
 Mr. Bangs held the superintendents of the differ- 
 ent divisions to strict accountability for the efi&ciency 
 of the railway service under their jurisdiction. He 
 established a system of checks upon postal railway 
 mail clerks through which delays of mail could be 
 traced directly to the person responsible, who was 
 immediately called to an account and reprimanded, 
 suspended, or removed from office, or exonerated, 
 if unjustly accused. The service was divided into 
 grades with differences in pay, clerks being pro- 
 moted as they became more proficient in their 
 work. All appointments were made to the lowest 
 grade, from which men were promoted or dropped 
 out. 
 
 This was before the days of what is now known 
 as civil service reform. Appointments in the postal 
 railway service were still made by the new adminis- 
 
 24 
 
The Railway Mail Service 
 
 tration upon the recommendation of Senators and 
 members of Congress. Mr. Bangs was too discreet a 
 man and too astute a politician to abolish or override 
 this custom. He did a much wiser thing. As 
 vacancies occurred, he advised the Postmaster- 
 General to appoint postal clerks upon the recom- 
 mendation of members of Congress as before. Had 
 the merit system, as it is called, in making appoint- 
 ments been then adopted in the postal railway 
 service, Congress would have turned against it and 
 refused appropriations. 
 
 A policy was adopted, however, upon Mr. Bangs's 
 recommendation, which gave efficiency to the ser- 
 vice and at the same time was entirely satisfactory 
 to the Senators and members of Congress. It was 
 to appoint such men as were recommended, upon 
 probation, to give them a three months' trial, and if, 
 at the end of that time, they proved to be competent 
 and valuable, to keep them. Otherwise they were 
 dropped, and others, recommended by the members 
 of Congress, given a trial. 
 
 Among other reforms a system was instituted 
 under which the accuracy and efficiency of a postal 
 clerk could be tested so thoroughly that there could 
 be no question about the character of the work he 
 performed — a system still followed. 
 
 At the time of the first inception of civil service 
 
 25 
 
The Railway Mail Service 
 
 reform, George William Curtis, Joseph Medill, 
 and Dorman B. Eaton, three of the most earnest 
 advocates of the reform, were made the commis- 
 sioners to put it in operation. They at once re- 
 paired to Washington and visited the different 
 departments of the Government. At the post-ofl&ce 
 department, in their calls upon the heads of the 
 different bureaus they finally found themselves in Mr. 
 Bangs's ofl&ce. After some preliminary conversation 
 in which they briefly outlined the work upon which 
 they had entered, Mr. Bangs drew from his drawer a 
 letter and handed it to Mr. Curtis, who appeared to 
 be the spokesman of the party, saying, "Gentlemen, 
 here is a letter I have lately received from one of 
 my postal clerks. Perhaps it will interest you." 
 I afterwards saw the letter and found it to be the 
 most wonderful specimen of orthography I had ever 
 seen. There was scarcely a word spelled correctly. 
 It was a marvel how any one could possibly, with 
 premeditation, develop the ingenuity to spell English 
 words in so remarkable a manner. The construc- 
 tion of the sentences was not so bad — the writer 
 stated clearly what he wanted and why, but the 
 spelling was ridiculous. 
 
 Mr. Curtis, after reading the letter, passed it to 
 the other members of the commission. It was so 
 extraordinary and so full of surprises that they could 
 
 26 
 
The Railway Mail Service 
 
 not suppress their merriment, and as attention was 
 directed to especial words they broke out into hearty 
 laughter. 
 
 Thereupon Mr. Curtis proceeded to point the 
 moral which was uppermost in his mind. He said, 
 "Now, Mr. Bangs, you see the importance of the 
 work of this commission. A man who writes such 
 a letter as that, an official letter, evidently the best 
 he can write, occupies one of the most responsible 
 positions in the service of the Government. He is 
 entrusted with missives the most important, — letters 
 upon the prompt delivery of which may depend great 
 business enterprises, that affect the weal or woe 
 perhaps of vast numbers of people, — messages of 
 love and condolence, of S5mipathy and hope, of 
 sorrow and despair. It is the object of this com- 
 mission to correct such evils, and to drive from the 
 public service all such men." The others took up 
 the matter and expressed themselves in the same 
 manner and even more earnestly. 
 
 Mr. Bangs waited patiently until they finished, 
 and then quietly remarked, "The man who wrote 
 that letter is the best postal railway clerk in the 
 United States." 
 
 The three commissioners were dumfounded and 
 could scarcely believe Mr. Bangs to be in earnest. 
 When they found him to be so, they asked how he 
 
 27 
 
The Railway Mail Service 
 
 could have the temerity to make such a statement 
 in regard to a man who writes such a letter. 
 
 "I say so," answered Mr. Bangs, "simply because 
 it is true; and you gentlemen propose to drive such 
 a man out of my service. You cannot do it while 
 I am here. You may be able to drive me out; 
 you can have my resignation at this moment if you 
 want it, but while I am here you cannot drive the 
 best man I have out of my service. The question 
 for me to ask concerning my men is, not whether they 
 can spell or parse or name and bound the countries 
 or cities of the earth, but whether they can do sat- 
 isfactorily the work that they are put to do." 
 
 "But how can you say, Mr. Bangs," asked Mr. 
 Curtis, "that a man who spells like that is a good 
 postal clerk? How can you possibly give any evi- 
 dence of it?" 
 
 "Come with me," said Mr. Bangs, "and I will 
 show you." 
 
 He led them into a room where two men were at 
 work before cases set up on a table, each case divided 
 into numerous pigeon-holes. Upon the table were 
 a great number of cards, upon each of which was 
 printed the name of a post-office. 
 
 "These men," Mr. Bangs explained, "are postal 
 clerks. All the men in the service are required at 
 stated intervals to appear at one of the larger post- 
 28 
 
THE "SWEAT CASE' 
 
The Railway Mail Service 
 
 ofl&ces, and distribute into a case like this, cards 
 like these. While upon their runs they are given 
 every aid possible for informing themselves — maps, 
 charts, time-tables, schedules of connections, and the 
 like. When a clerk comes before this case he can 
 have no book before him to which he can refer for 
 information, but he must distribute the cards from 
 memory. Upon his ability to distribute correctly 
 these cards, we learn how many mistakes he would 
 make if upon his run. If he throws a card right it 
 shows that the letter he would distribute must be 
 placed upon the right train or stage line or boat, 
 and go at once to its proper destination. If he 
 throws it wrong, it shows that the letter would go 
 astray and would certainly lose a connection. When 
 the postal clerk has finished this distribution of 
 these cards, he goes back to his run and an expert 
 goes through the case, with books and charts of 
 all the postal railways and stage lines and steam-' 
 boats, and notes every mistake made. Upon the 
 report of this expert depends the standing of the 
 postal clerk, or the question of whether he be con- 
 tinued or dropped from the service. The boys 
 have named this case the 'sweat' case.* The 
 
 * After the postal clerk has finished this distribution of the cards, he 
 surrenders the case to the examiner and is not allowed to make any changes 
 in the casing of the cards, with a view to rectifying errors in distribution, 
 but must, if possible, remain at the case while his work is being reviewed. 
 
 29 
 
The Railway Mail Service 
 
 man who wrote the letter I showed you made fewer 
 mistakes than any other man in the service. In 
 fact, he scarcely made any mistakes at all, and 
 besides, he proved to be more speedy in his work 
 than any other, a test that we are also now making. 
 
 "The thing to find out in the public service, as I 
 said before," continued Mr. Bangs, "is, who can best 
 do the work he is put to do, and keep him and pro- 
 mote him, and to rid the service of those who prove 
 themselves incapable. This I am trying to do." 
 
 It is enough to say of the commission that they 
 became convinced that the postal railway service 
 
 The examiner begins the examination by taking the seat just vacated 
 by the clerk, and placing at hand, for reference, a corrected scheme of the 
 State and a schedule of railway connections, to which he refers when in 
 doubt as to the correct casing of a card. Then he takes the packages 
 from the case, one at a time, and examines the address on each card until 
 all the cards in the case have passed under review. In doing this work 
 the examiner relies on his memory mainly, as the clerk does, except he 
 has, as before stated, the scheme and schedule to refer to in cases of doubt, 
 and this in the interest of the clerks as well as a help to the examiner. 
 In distributing the cards the clerk places those addressed to offices at 
 junctions in a special box or in the box occupied by those for the route 
 which can supply them the quickest. 
 
 If distributed in a special box they are allowed to remain therein until 
 the other boxes have been examined; then the examiner takes this pack- 
 age from the case and passes it in review, card by card, naming each in 
 succession, and the clerk must be prepared to give the designation of each 
 railway post-office centring at that junction, the time each is due to 
 leave and arrive, and by which he would despatch mail to insure its quick- 
 est delivery when it can be despatched via two or more routes. 
 
 If the junctions are distributed to the route supplying them the quick- 
 est, the examiner calls the clerk's attention to them as they are reached and 
 he must treat them as mentioned above. As the examination progresses 
 and errors in the distribution are discovered they are shown to the clerk, 
 as a matter of information, and on completion of each examination the 
 examiner ^ves the clerk a statement of the result, the name of the State 
 upon which he will next be examined, and informs him what will be the 
 nature of the examination. 
 
 A record of all examinations is kept in the office of the superintendent 
 to whose division the clerks examined are assigned. 
 
 3° 
 
The Railway Mail Service 
 
 was at that time the most practical and the best 
 civil service in the United States, and they so declared. 
 
 George William Curtis was so pleased and de- 
 lighted with the service that he, in "Harper's Maga- 
 zine," of which he was editor, published articles 
 giving full and exhaustive accounts of it, illustrated 
 with pictures of postal cars, showing the men at work 
 and ever3^hing relating to the service, among which 
 there was nothing more conspicuous than the 
 sweat case. 
 
 This " sweat case," let it be noted, was invented 
 by Captain James E. White, afterwards general 
 superintendent of the postal railway service, — the 
 examination case, as it is oflScially called. He was 
 then chief postal clerk at Omaha, having been 
 assigned to that position while running as a postal 
 railway clerk. He conceived the idea and had 
 the case made for the purpose of testing the capa- 
 bilities of the clerks in his jurisdiction. When he 
 had designed this examination case, as he named 
 it, he had the master car builder of the Union Pacific 
 shops make it. 
 
 But George S. Bangs's greatest achievement 
 lies in the establishment of the Fast Mail. He 
 was accustomed to say that he expected to see the 
 time come when the mails would be given the pref- 
 erence over any passenger, and mail trains the 
 
 31 
 
The Railway Mail Service 
 
 right of way over all passenger trains, and that he 
 was working to that end. In those good old con- 
 servative days of slow and sure, I thought his views 
 chimerical, but I saw him succeed in inaugurating 
 his system, — not only this, I, by his invitation, 
 accompanied him on the first fast mail train ever 
 run. 
 
 THE FIRST FAST MAIL TRAIN 
 
 This epoch-marking train went from New York 
 to Chicago over the New York Central & Hudson 
 River and the Lake Shore & Michigan Southern 
 railways. It l eft Ne w York at four o'clock on the 
 morning of September i6, 1875, and was scheduled 
 to arrive in Chicago at six o'clock _oiL_thejxLoming 
 of the following day . Mr. Bangs himself was in 
 charge of the train when I joined it at Cleveland. I 
 shall never forget the look of triumph that illumined 
 the face of the great postal official as he stood upon 
 the platform, watch in hand, as the mighty train, all 
 of postal cars, came thundering into the station at 
 Cleveland, on time. 
 
 It was interesting to talk with Mr. Bangs, seated as 
 we were together on mail pouches and watching the 
 postal clerks at their work, while the train sped 
 upon its way. He told of the incidents of the 
 momentous journey and of his campaigns with 
 railway officials, finally expressing his high appre- 
 
 32 
 
The Railway Mail Service 
 
 ciation and regard for the ofl&cials of the New York 
 Central and the Lake Shore railways, who, so soon 
 as they understood the matter, entered in to it with 
 enthusiasm, and provided this splendid trai n, 
 t horoughly equ ipped for t he service. As for the 
 matter of the importance of a fast mail service, he 
 said, "After loading this train to its utmost capacity, 
 we left a large amount of mail on the platform in 
 New York which we could not take. The fast mail 
 is now established for all time. The public will 
 never permit it to be discontinued." 
 
 Upon arriving at Toledo, — I think it was Toledo, 
 — we were about twenty minutes late. The division 
 superintendent of the railway, with Bangs, walked 
 forward on the platform to the engine, and I fol- 
 lowed. The schedule time for the train was fast 
 for those days, and it was important to the railway 
 that it should arrive on time, as the whole nation was 
 watching it through the public press. The engineer 
 leaned out of his cab as the superintendent spoke to 
 him a few hurried words, of which I only heard 
 him say as we hastily withdrew to the car, "You 
 must make it." 
 
 We drove into the Lake Shore station at Chicago 
 and stopped, some said, a minute ahead of, certainly 
 on, time, — and the fast mail service was inau- 
 gurated. From that day forward there has never 
 
 33 
 
The Railway Mail Service 
 
 been a cessation of the fast mail service. Its 
 benefits were so immediately apparent and gratify- 
 ing that every one appreciated them. The people 
 would no more consent to return to the old sys- 
 tem than they would to go back to the old stage- 
 coach mail routes. 
 
 The public watched this fast mail experiment 
 with profound interest. There were those who said 
 that such an innovation would be too expensive 
 and was unnecessary. I remember that the St. 
 Louis papers grumbled because the experiment was 
 not made in the direction of St. Louis instead of 
 Chicago, and assailed Mr. Bangs for taking the Chi- 
 cago route. Wagers were made that the train would 
 not make schedule time. The daily papers published 
 reports from the train, and bulletins were displayed 
 giving the time it was making from hour to hour. 
 It was important to the railway ofl&cials that a 
 train, every movement of which was being watched 
 by the people of the whole great nation, should be 
 on time. No man felt this in a greater degree than 
 the engineer who made the final run into Chicago. 
 He was wrought up to such a degree as to be over- 
 come, but he held on until the goal was reached. As 
 we got out of the cars there were a number of persons 
 gathered about the engine. Upon approaching it 
 we found the engineer lying flat upon his back in 
 
 34 
 
The Railway Mail Service 
 
 the cab. He had held the lever and kept his train 
 in hand until he reached his destination, but upon 
 releasing his grasp, had fallen back apparently dead; 
 the great strain had been too much for him. But 
 the brave engineer was soon restored to conscious- 
 ness. 
 
 All the leading railways of the United States, 
 east and west and north and south, now have 
 fast mail trains, the speed of which averages forty 
 miles an hour. They cover thousands of miles in 
 extent, and each is equipped with the finest mail 
 cars and ample crews of the most competent and 
 efficient postal railway clerks. Trips both ways 
 are made over these roads by fast mail trains every 
 day. 
 
 As men and women read their letters from home 
 and friends and kindred thousands of miles away, 
 almost before the ink with which they are written is 
 dry; as business men receive cash remittances and 
 households get returns from their mail orders with 
 such promptness; as, hundreds of miles from the 
 metropolis where they are printed, we read at break- 
 fast in our morning papers the news from every 
 part of the globe, it is eminently proper, fitting, and 
 just that we pause to reflect upon how and when 
 and by whom all this has been made possible. 
 When we so pause and reflect, we must place high 
 
 3S 
 
The Railway Mail Service 
 
 upon the scroll of fame the names of George B. 
 Armstrong and George S. Bangs. 
 
 CAPTAIN JAMES E. WHITE 
 
 In 1870 at Chicago, Gecrge S. Bangs introduced 
 me to Captain James E. White, then quite a young 
 man. 
 
 Mr. Bangs spoke of the young gentleman in terms 
 of high commendation, saying that he had served 
 for several years as a postal clerk, was capable and 
 efficient enough to attract the attention of both 
 George B. Armstrong and himself, and that they 
 were about to make him, or had made him, chief 
 postal clerk at Omaha. Captain White held this 
 position of chief head clerk until the reorganization of 
 the service through the retirement of Mr. Armstrong 
 and the appointment of Mr. Bangs to the position 
 of general superintendent, when, after a brief inter- 
 val, he was made superintendent of the sixth division. 
 
 Finally, after several years of honorable service, 
 Captain White was made general superintendent 
 of the railway mail service at Washington. In the 
 interim between the retirement of Mr. Bangs and this 
 last promotion of Captain White, six persons held 
 the position of general superintendent of the railway 
 mail service, performing its duties conscientiously 
 and ably and with credit to themselves. It was 
 
 36 
 
CAPTAIN JAMES E. WHITE 
 Who Brought the Postal Railway Service to Its Present Perfection 
 
The Railway Mail Service 
 
 not my privilege to know those gentlemen so inti- 
 mately as I knew Armstrong, Bangs, and White, 
 and therefore I cannot venture to give an account 
 of their valuable services. They were Theodore 
 N. Vail, William B. Thompson, John Jameson, 
 Thomas E. Nash, William L. Bancroft, and J. 
 Lowrie Bell. 
 
 On February 4, 1907, on account of failing 
 health. Captain White retired from the service. 
 He had held the position of general superintendent 
 for sixteen years, a period longer than that of all 
 the six general superintendents between the retire- 
 ment of Mr. Bangs and his own accession, combined. 
 
 When Captain White retired, the Postmaster- 
 General, the Hon. G. B. Cortelyou, wrote a letter 
 highly commendatory of his long and faithful 
 service, which was read with great interest and 
 satisfaction throughout the country. 
 ' While Captain White was general superintendent, 
 the postal railway service was increased enormously. 
 When he became general superintendent, October 
 4, 1890, the number of postal railway clerks was 
 5,836. When he retired, February 4, 1907, the 
 number was about 14,000, an increase of about 
 8,164. The number of miles of railway upon which 
 mail was carried when Captain White became 
 general superintendent was about 154,779. When 
 
 \ 
 
The Railway Mail Service 
 
 he resigned, the mail was carried upon 203,000 miles 
 of railway, an increase of 49,000 miles. The 
 annual transportation of mails increased during 
 these sixteen years about 161,945,391 miles. The 
 annual miles of service performed by crews increased, 
 duriag the sixteen years, about 146,509,096 miles. 
 The number of pieces handled of all classes in- 
 creased 11,684,158,875. 
 
 There was a remarkable decrease in mistakes in 
 proportion to pieces of mail handled, during Cap- 
 tain White's superintendency. In 1890 out of 7,847,- 
 723,600 pieces of mail handled, 2,834 were distrib- 
 uted correctly for every mistake, while in 1906, 
 in handling 19,531,882,475, there was but one mis- 
 take in handling 11,822 pieces, a very remarkable 
 showing, considering that the work of the railway 
 postal clerks has increased in other directions to a 
 degree not deemed possible a few years ago. 
 
 Well might Captain White proudly exclaim in a 
 letter to the writer, received since his retirement: 
 
 The railway postal clerks deserve the highest 
 commendation for the steadfastness of purpose 
 they have manifested, the energy they have dis- 
 played, and their persistence in developing that 
 concentration of mind upon the acquisition of 
 knowledge of the work in which they are engaged — 
 and memorizing it — that is so essential to eflaciency 
 and usefulness. 
 
 38 
 
The Railway Mail Service 
 
 Time and space do not permit going into a 
 detailed account of the improvements of the railway 
 mail service in the handling and despatch of regis- 
 tered letters and packages. Such a detailed account 
 would prove the high character and strict integrity of 
 the railway mail clerks as well as show that there 
 has been as great improvement in this important 
 branch of the service. 
 
 THE EXAMINATION CASE 
 
 Had Captain ^Vhite done no more than invent 
 and put into operation the examination case, he 
 would have accompHshed enough to place his name 
 high up among those of the illustrious men whose 
 achievements created and brought to the highest eflS- 
 ciency the railway mail service. That device is a 
 perfect test of the ability, the aptitude, the efficiency 
 of every individual railway mail clerk in the United 
 States. It makes no mistakes. It deals honestly 
 and justly with each man who comes before it. 
 There is no favoritism. It accords to every mam 
 the fuU meed of credit he deserves, just that and 
 no more, and it exposes inefficiency and weakness. 
 While it recognizes capacity and encourages the 
 deserving, it has no patience with the incompetent 
 and unworthy, and they are glad to retire from its 
 august presence to other vocations. It is not re- 
 
 39 
 
The Railway Mail Service 
 
 markable that the unworthy tremble when required 
 to stand before and be judged by such an inexorable 
 tribunal. It is not remarkable that it should have 
 been given the title of the " sweat " case.* 
 
 Captain White was a patriotic Union soldier in 
 the Civil War and was wounded in his country's 
 service. In his career as a postal official, through 
 the grades of the railway mail service, he has imbued 
 and maintained among all those in his department 
 an esprit de corps that has given life and ambition 
 and character and devotion to those with whom he 
 has come in contact. Sitting at the feet of George 
 B. Armstrong and George S. Bangs, and learning of 
 them, he drank from the copious fountains of their 
 experience and wisdom, and his breast became ani- 
 mated with the emotions that moved them. Their 
 influence upon his youthful sensibilities caused him 
 to think as they thought and to do as they did, to 
 such a degree that in his judgment the delay of a 
 letter was a crime, and with him carelessness or neg- 
 lect in handling of mail was inexcusable. 
 
 ♦Captain White also originated "The schedule of mail and express 
 trains at junctions." 
 
 The initial schedule was for the State of Wisconsin and was printed 
 in the March, 1872, number of the "Chicago Postal Record." It was 
 immediately approved by General Superintendent Bangs, who predicted 
 it would become of inestimable value, and directed its use throughout 
 the service. This schedule was followed month by month by schedules 
 of other States. The first schedules had footnotes explaining and illustrat- 
 ing how they were intended to be applied, and the clerks soon understood 
 the method sufficiently to make the discontinuance of these notes feasible. 
 
 40 
 
The Railway Mail Service 
 
 There was in his estimation no higher attribute 
 of government than that of facilitating intercom- 
 munication among the people, and with the least 
 possible delay bringing information to them from 
 all parts of the world through the newspapers and 
 
 The first schedules were in sheet form, the next in book form, contain- 
 ing the names of the junctions and the information under each, as for 
 instance : 
 
 JUNCTIONS 
 
 MAIX 
 
 EXPRESS 
 
 Peoria 
 
 Bureau June. & Feoria, Agt. 
 
 Indianapolis & Peoria, Agt. . 
 Logansport & Warsaw, Agt . 
 
 Peoria & Decatur, Agt 
 
 Peoria & Galesburg, Agt. . . . 
 Peoria & Jacksonville, Agt. . . 
 Peoria & Terre Haute, Agt. . 
 Rock Island & Feoria, Agt. . 
 Chicago & Peoria, Agt 
 
 ! Leave 
 Arrive 
 Leave 
 Arrive 
 (E. 
 ( W. 
 
 ! Leave 
 Arrive 
 f Leave 
 (.Arrive 
 } Leave 
 / Arrive 
 ( Leave 
 I Arrive 
 ( Leave 
 I Arrive 
 
 i Leave 
 Arrive 
 
 45 A. M. 
 too P.M. 
 
 ;oS A. M. 
 
 •.?.0 p. M. 
 
 :o5 A. M. 
 :SS P. M. 
 
 45 A. M. 
 
 ;iS P. M. 
 :20 p. M. 
 
 125 A. M. 
 :oo A. M. 
 :20 p. M. 
 
 150 A. M. 
 
 :io p. k. 
 :5o A. M. 
 ■.30 p. M. 
 :40 A. M. 
 :oo P. M. 
 
 10:00 
 6:00 
 
 7:2s 
 7:40 
 
 7:1s 
 8:40 
 
 4:4s 
 10:30 
 
 8:iS 
 7:20 
 5:00 
 7:00 
 
 P. M. 
 A. U. 
 P. M. 
 A. M. 
 P. M. 
 A. M. 
 P. M. 
 A. M. 
 A. M. 
 P. M. 
 P. M. 
 P. M. 
 
 Mackinaw 
 
 Indianapolis & Peoria, Agt . 
 
 Peoria & Terre Haute, Agt. 
 
 jE. 
 IW. 
 
 IE. 
 •W. 
 
 10:05 A- M- 
 
 2 -.36 p. M. 
 
 II :24 A. M. 
 
 2 :22 p. M. 
 
 8:37 p. M. 
 6:29 A. U. 
 
 Paris 
 
 Danville & Vincennes, Agt 
 
 Indianapolis, Pana & St. L. R. P. O. 
 
 Feoria & Terre Haute, Agt 
 
 •S. 
 
 Me. 
 
 Iw. 
 
 |e. 
 I w. 
 
 7 :3o A. M. 
 
 5 :4o p. M. 
 
 2 :43 p. M. 
 
 II :2i A. M. 
 
 6:00 P. M. 
 
 8:10 A. M. 
 
 12:51 A. M. 
 
 2 :o4 A. M. 
 
 1 1 :40 A. M. 
 
 6:25 p. M. 
 
 Next came the sheet form again, which was more artistic and embraced 
 all the States in the division and more information. The above example 
 was copied from a schedule issued August 5, 187S. 
 
 41 
 
The Railway Mail Service 
 
 public journals. He thought no effort should be 
 spared and no outlay in appropriations by Congress 
 withheld, that would tend to bring about these 
 results. 
 
 Captain White also realized that in order to make 
 effective the work of the government in providing 
 fast mail trains, with their equipment and all other 
 appliances, the men in the postal railway service 
 should be thoroughly equipped and ready upon the 
 instant, through study and training, to handle and 
 distribute all mail, and that they be conscientious in 
 the performance of duty. He brought those men 
 up to his own ideals — the highest standard of ex- 
 cellence, and kept them there during all his career 
 as superintendent. 
 
 Captain White has laid down his burdens and 
 retired to private life to try to recuperate from the 
 strain of his long and arduous labors in the service 
 of his country, followed by the affection and devotion 
 of every man who ever knew him, and especially of 
 those who served with him and under him. It is 
 hardly possible that any other man could have ac- 
 complished so much in extendipg the scope and 
 enlarging the bounds and usefulness of the railway 
 mail service. Certain it is that no other man could 
 have built up a more intelligent and efl&cient corps 
 of men than those in that service. 
 
 42 
 
ALEXANDER GRANT 
 Present General Superintendent of the Railway Mail Service 
 
The Railway Mail Service 
 
 During several years Captain White has had 
 the assistance and support of Mr. Alexander Grant, 
 who grew up and was trained under his eye, a man 
 who has gained the confidence and esteem of the 
 men in the service. Upon Mr. Grant's shoulders 
 has fallen the mantle of Captain White. Most 
 properly he has been appointed to succeed his chief 
 as general superintendent. 
 
 THE MEN OF THE POSTAL RAILWAY SEKVICE 
 
 The men of the postal railway service perform 
 their duties so quietly and with so little ostentation 
 that the general public hardly realizes that they 
 exist. Yet there is no class of men in the Govern- 
 ment who bring to their vocation more intelligence, 
 or are better equipped for their duties. In the 
 education of the schools they are proficient, and in 
 all that pertains to their duties there are no more 
 exact and thorough specialists. They have been 
 tried and found worthy and thoroughly competent 
 before that august tribunal, the sweat case. They 
 know every route and every connection of every 
 railway, and so completely have they mastered the 
 problems connected with them that to throw a 
 piece of mail right has become so natural that they 
 cannot, without doing violence to their sensibilities, 
 throw it wrong. 
 
 43 
 
The Railway Mail Service 
 
 There is no class of men more conscientious and 
 faithful. In the mails there appears to them nothing 
 so unimportant or trivial that it can be neglected or 
 slighted. A little child's letter to Santa Claus is 
 forwarded with care and attention not less faithful 
 than that of a registered parcel of great value. 
 Of no other service can it be truthfully said that in 
 11,822 specific acts, as involved in the distribution 
 of mail, only one mistake is made. 
 
 As has been said, the postal clerks who handle 
 the vast amount of mail carried upon the railways 
 number fourteen thousand. Their duties are exact- 
 ing. They must be at their posts, ready to go out, 
 at a specified moment. For them to fail would cause 
 disappointment and grief, and might disarrange and 
 overwhelm vast business enterprises. To have a 
 proper realization of how important they are to 
 the public weal, let one imagine them to cease work 
 for twenty-four hours. The business of the country 
 would be for the time being paralyzed, and the 
 wheels of Government stopped in their revolutions. 
 
 There is no governmental service more laborious 
 and exacting . They must be alert every moment, 
 and the work must be performed with celerity and 
 despatch. As the train speeds on its way out, 
 showers of mail pour in, which, unless cleared away, 
 will overwhelm the whole force in a car. There 
 
 44 
 
The Railway Mail Service 
 
 is scarcely any other work so trying upon the nerves 
 or so fatiguing. 
 
 They are, while the train is in motion, always 
 exposed to danger. At all hours of the day or 
 night, in pitch darkness, when storms are raging, 
 streams are swollen, and bridges unsafe, when, 
 soaked with water the roadbed is unsteady, if the 
 train goes out, the postal clerk must be in his car. 
 Through desert sands and miry, treacherous swamps, 
 through deep gorges and tunnels, around precipitous 
 rocks, along shelves chiselled into the mountain-side, 
 the train must go. Shut in his car, though the train 
 be flying at the utmost limit of speed, though perils 
 threaten and dangers appal, he has no warning. 
 He has no chance to save himself. At the last 
 extremity the engineer and fireman may jump, the 
 soldier may shelter himself behind the breastworks, 
 but there is no place of refuge for the railway postal 
 clerk. In nearly every casualty that has happened 
 to a railway postal clerk it has been demonstrated 
 that when the crash came he was before his table at 
 work, his memory enshrouded and enshrined in 
 the messages of love and devotion and sorrow and 
 hope he was faithfully striving to forward to their 
 destination. When one becomes a railway postal 
 clerk he takes his life in his hands. 
 
 During the last fiscal year (1907), there were 328 
 
 45 
 
The Railway Mail Service 
 
 railroad accidents in which postal clerks were either 
 killed or injured, and in which mail matter was lost 
 or damaged. There were killed sixteen mail clerks 
 and one weigher. Seventy-seven mail clerks were 
 seriously injured, 414 slightly injured. 
 
 I believe that the corps of fourteen thousand 
 railway mail clerks is the most efl&cient body in the 
 public service of the United States. I believe 
 that in intelligence and devotion to duty and in 
 heroism they are not surpassed by any body of men, 
 including those in the army and navy. I believe 
 that every postal railway clerk who faithfully serves 
 through the strength and vigor of his mature life 
 ought to be pensioned by the Government when he 
 retires from the service. 
 
 46 
 
INDEX 
 
 Altona, 111., 2 
 
 Armstrong, George B., 7-24, 36, 
 
 37 
 Arnold, Hon. I. N., 2 
 Aurora, 111., 3, 4, 9, 22, 23 
 Bancroft, William L., 37 
 Bangs, George S., 3, 9, 10, 13, 15, 
 
 22-34, 36, 37. 40 
 Bell, J. Lowrie, 37 
 Billing system, 5, 6, 9 
 Blair, Hon. Montgomery, 15, 20 
 Boone, Iowa, 16 
 Burlington Railway, see Chicago, 
 
 Burlington and Quincy Railway. 
 Cairo, 111., importance of post- 
 
 o£&ce during Civil War, 11-13 
 Cars for railway post-office, first, 
 
 16, 20, 21 
 Checks on clerks to avoid delays, 
 
 system of, 24 
 Chicago and North- Western Rail- 
 way, 16 
 Chicago, Burlington and Quincy 
 
 Railway, 2, 4, 17 
 Chicago post-office, 7, 8 
 Chicago Postal Record, 40 
 Chicago, Rock Island and Pacific 
 
 Railway, 17 
 Chicago Tribune, 7 
 Civil service in postal railway 
 
 service, 24-31 
 Civil War, mail service during, 
 
 10-12; hindered development 
 
 of railway mail service, 14 
 Clinton, Iowa, 16 
 Colfax, Hon. Schuyler, 15 
 Commission to introduce civil 
 
 service reform in mail service, 
 
 26-30 
 Compartment cars, 4, 16, 18 
 Cortelyou, Hon. G. B., 37 
 Council Bluflfs, Iowa, 16 
 Curtis, George William, 26-28, 
 
 31 
 Dangerous situation of postal 
 
 clerks, 45, 46 
 Davis, William A., 19 
 
 Decrease of mistakes in handling 
 
 mail, 38 
 Democrats succeeded in office by 
 
 Republicans, 6, 9 
 "Distributing post-offices," 5 
 Downer's Grove, 111., 3 
 Eastern railways, mail service on, 
 
 17 
 
 Eastman, Col. Francis A., 13 
 
 Eaton, Dorman B., 26 
 
 Eddy, Hon. W. H. ("Hoss Ed- 
 dy") 1-4, 6 
 
 Erie Railway, 17 
 
 Examination case, 28-31, 39. See 
 also "Sweat case." 
 
 Fast mail, 22, 31-35 
 
 Franklin, Benjamin, billing sys- 
 tem introduced by, 5 
 
 Galesburg, 111., 5, 6 
 
 Grades in clerkships, 24 
 
 Grant, Alexander, 43 
 
 Harper's Magazine, 31 
 
 Hinsdale, 111., 3 
 
 Increase of postal railvfay ser- 
 vice, 37 
 
 Jameson, John, 37 
 
 Keyes, Hon. E. W., 9, 10, 13, 15 
 
 Lake Shore and Michigan South- 
 ern Railway, 32, 33 
 
 Lincoln, Abraham, 6, 10, 11 
 
 Linnegar, Hon. David T., 10-12 
 
 Logan, John A., 11 
 
 Madison, Wis., 9 
 
 McGrath, M. J., 17 
 
 Medill, Joseph, 26 
 
 Men of the postal railway service, 
 43-46 
 
 Merit system, 25 
 
 Nash, Thomas E., 37 
 
 New York Central & Hudson 
 River Railway, 32, 33 
 
 Night mail service, 4 
 
 Number of postal clerks, 44 
 
 Omaha, Neb., 31, 36 
 
 Overland .-nail to Pacific coast, 16 
 
 Palmer, Potter, 3 
 
 Park, Harrison, 17 
 
 47 
 
Index 
 
 Patents, valuable, 21 
 Pennsylvania Railway, 17 
 Pullman, George M., 20, 21 
 Railway post-office, first, 16 
 Registered mail matter, 39 
 Republicans succeed Democrats 
 
 in office, 6, 9 
 Riverside, 111., 3 
 Route agent system, 18 
 St. Louis, Mo., 34 
 "Schedule of mail and express 
 
 trains at junctions. The," 40, 
 
 41 
 Scripps, John L., 6, 7 
 Sleeping cars, 20, 21 
 
 Stuart, James E., 17 
 
 "Sweat case," 28-31, 40. See 
 
 also Examination case. 
 Systems introduced by George S. 
 
 Bangs, 24, 25 
 Thompson, William B., 37 
 Trial appointments, 25 
 Union Pacific shops, master car 
 
 builder of, 31 
 Vail, Theodore N., 37 
 Watch presented to George B. 
 
 Armstrong, 13 
 White, Capt. James E., 17, 31, 
 
 36-43 
 Zevely, Hon. A. N., 15 
 
 48 
 
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