The Edwardian era marked the high point of international Sea Post Service. Most shipping lines relied upon the revenues generated by sea post contracts to survive. Sea post clerks were highly skilled and respected postal workers who sorted, canceled and redistributed the mail in transit. Regarded as the best of the best, these men typically sorted over 60,000 letters a day, making few, if any errors in the process. Their hard work and efficiency allowed the mail to be delivered immediately or forwarded directly to other destinations at the end of a voyage. Frequently, as in the case of Titanic, a ship’s sea post clerks came from different nations. The glory days of the Sea Post Service ended after World War I, fading away with the great ships that once housed such shipboard post offices.
  

Titanic at Sea     Loading the Mail at Queenstown, Ireland Courtesy of the Fr. Browne S.J. Collection, The Irish Picture Library.

Most American sea post clerks were selected for duty from the ranks of the Railway Mail Service or from the Foreign Mail Section of the postal system. Americans John Starr March and Oscar Scott Woody each had 15 years of experience with the Railway Mail Service. William Logan Gwinn spent six years as a sorting clerk in the Foreign Mail Section before going to sea. The three Americans worked with British clerks James Bertram Williamson and John Richard Jago Smith.
 

COMMITMENT TO DUTY

Mail was considered a precious cargo. Steam ship companies and the postal system went to great lengths to ensure its safe arrival.  Sea post clerks were expected to protect the mail at any cost, including their lives if necessary. The American Sea Post Service suffered its first fatalities in 1894 when the steamer Elbe sank in the North Sea. All of Titanic’s sea post clerks shared this total and absolute commitment to duty and to protect the mail. During Titanic’s sinking, the five clerks fought desperately to save the mail ultimately forfeiting any chance to escape the ship.

Typical Mail Sorting Rooms

On April 9, 1912, postal officials, including Titanic mail clerks John Starr March and William Logan Gwinn, toured their new ship. They found much to like about the vessel. Titanic’s mail sorting room was far superior to any they had ever worked in before. Most mail sorting rooms of the time were far removed from where the mailbags were stored, often relegated to a cramped and poorly ventilated space. The mailbag storage compartment aboard Titanic, however, was conveniently located directly below the mail sorting room.

The American clerks did object to their sleeping and meal arrangements aboard Titanic. Originally, their cabins were situated among the third-class passengers, said to be “mostly low class Continentals, [who] keep up a noisy conversation sometimes throughout the silent hours and even indulge at times in singing and [playing] instrumental music.” Eventually the clerks secured alternate accommodations and permission to dine in a private area, as insisted in a memorandum they sent to postal officials and White Star Line owners. 

In all, 3,364 mailbags were brought aboard Titanic at three points -- at its embarkation port at Southampton, England (1,758 bags), at Cherbourg, France (1,412 bags), and at Queenstown, Ireland (194 sacks) -- before the ship headed for its final destination of New York City. Before sailing, the clerks carried out the routine tasks of checking the mail sacks and storing those that did not require their attention during the voyage. As Titanic set sail, the five postal workers began sorting the mail, distributing letters and packages into mailbags according to their final destination.

Crewmen Loading Mail at Queenstown, Ireland
Courtesy of the Fr. Browne S.J. Collection, The Irish Picture Library. 

Servicing transatlantic mail was an enormous task. Roughly 80 million pieces of mail -- almost one letter for every man, woman, and child in the United States at the time -- was handled by the Sea Post Service, and most entered the United States through Quarantine Station in New York Harbor.

As Titanic set sail, the sea post clerks began sorting the mail for New York City and other locations in the United States.  Their goal was to prepare Titanic’s mail ready for immediate dispatch upon arrival at the Quarantine Station in New York Bay, where all incoming ships were detained for health inspection purposes. Had Titanic arrived in New York, the mail would have been well on its way long before Titanic’s last passengers had disembarked.
 
  

Harbor Mail Boats at Quarantine   Offloading the Mail at Quarantine