Information Sought On Area Of Use Of Registration Label For London Ec 19.

Hello All,

This rather flamboyant, but to me at least, very attractive cover raises questions.

All the rubber hand-stamps clearly read
REGISTERED KING ST. B.O. E.C.2 but the registration label reads E.C. 19.

What area of London is covered by E.C. 19 ?

Despite web searches on Google and Bing I have been unable to find E.C. 19. at all.
A lot of information on postcodes, areas and changes but no mention of this one.
The nearest I have found is EC1P but the label is very clear E.C. 19.


The questions arose when preparing to write up the cover stating that the letter was registered at the....Post Office.

Any information regarding E.C. 19 would be much appreciated.

Regards,

Ron.

Nothing here.
I would guess it just refers to a booklet number
or similar.
(Booklets all came in repeat numbers 0001 to ? etc)

I have seen EC15 , EC45 etc & etc on Postmarks.

I have ROMFORD 5 Registration Label which is an East London Post Office.

I have a collection of England Registration Labels, dashed if I can find them at the moment.


Example
London WC (West Central)
WC 13 and WC 92

Rod,

Thanks for that response.

Amazing the amount of 'stuff' you have (great to see all your various country items on the threads.)

I recall, working in various P.O's in different countries where the registration labels come in sheets and more than one can be in use at any time.

Thanks for the images too.

As a matter of interest this is part of a response I got from another board.
Quote

The registration label is, as you know, for the London East Central Postal District, divided into 4, and then into lower levels since modern postcodes were introduced.

19 would be either for an individual main post office, or for a large business user who kept a stock of labels to apply before taking the post to the post office. It is not area specific as far as I know, especially in such a small area.

Unquote

Cheers
Ron

EC19 is not a geographical postal area according to my "Philip's London Street atlas" of 2007. There were at that time EC1, EC2, EC3, EC4, these areas are are adjacent to the north bank of the Thames, east of Westminster and Camden WC1,& WC2 they are in the "County of the City of London" whatever that is.

Ron,
this is an exciting thread in some respects,
I think Eunice would do well (or your good self) to research.

I had to dig into my "Great Britain Album 5" to find those rascals.

My digital album let me down.

Here we have a gallimaufry of Registration Labels

LONDON EC Types

London ECK
London EC'R'
London EC244 (2 differing)
London EC95B

What I would like to see, is a scan of an old page in the registration books/journals, to see what headings / information that was required used.

This made my day and makes me feel good about the effort that we all put into this community. The fact that the forum helps getting collectors to dive back into their albums what it is all about!

Don

Gallimaufry: "a dish made from diced or minced meat, especially a hash or ragout"


I love this also Don. It comes up with all sorts of strange words, but the above does not make any sense Wonder if this is from the land of Oz?


Peter

Don

Below link is about Austrian registered letter labels. This mentions the numbers after the town name refer to offices. Further on, there also is a letter after the registration number. The writer thinks this is a roll letter.

The answer Penguins received on another board are in line with this article.

http://austrianphilately.com/reglabel/index.htm

The ones Rod shows appear to confirm the labels only had the main postal district code for the London labels. As Noocassel writes, the EC district only has (and had) four sub-districts. It makes sense this number identifies the place it was registered. I, somehow, doubt Reading had 107 post offices at some time. That would support the part of the answer about large businesses.

Ron,
if you are a member of the GBPS
https://www.gbps.org.uk/displays/re...ntroduction/

Many thanks to everyone on this topic, an incredible amount of information.

Rod, you have taken a lot of trouble and dug deep with all that information. So grateful thanks for that.

As a matter of interest, I do have a copy of "Registered Mail of the British Isles" by James A. Mackay (a massive tome running to 395 pages) and I tried to find an answer in that before posting the query.
No luck though.

I am also a member of the GBPS and had not realised that Maurice had a display in the exhibition section, which I have now checked.

Should a definitive answer arise I will of course post it here.

Stamp Community usually 'comes good' and all input is gratefully accepted.

Regards to all
Ron

a

Ron,
hope I am not labouring the thread, but your cover (a cracking one at that! ) continues to bring up questions.
FIRST DAY COVER

I cannot find any information on the King Street Branch Office

I have looked in Hendy etc, nothing.
Not listed in the London Suburban 1829 -1857
Not listed in the Postmark Database

That will be a new discovery, if you contact the Webmaster
Whilst there, you may wish to ask Allan regarding the EC19 query


Let us know if you get any info, perhaps a new Post office in the 1960's

Curiosity : Prior to the organisation of "London Districts" Postal delivery, confusion reigned (excuse the pun)
There were over 50 "King Streets", 50 "Queen Streets" and over 60 "John" and "William Streets"

Below is pic of King Street location (near the medieval Guildhall) and POSTMAN'S PARK



Also for your interest
London Postal Districts for EC (East Central London)

Rod,

Many thanks for all this interesting information,you certainly take a great deal of trouble to get to the bottom of things,
It is very much appreciated.

An interesting comment about the King St B.O. not being on the data base.

You mentioned this data base previously and I sent a couple of items but have had no response and did not know if it is still 'active'.


There has been a reply to this query on another board by a member of the G.B.P.S. and to put everyone in the picture this is what he says.

Quote

Ah, this is a postal history "gotcha". The E.C.19 in this case identifies the post office, not the delivery area.

Basically, when registration labels were introduced in 1907, town sub-offices were identified on the labels by the name of the town (or London district) and a sub-office number (allocated by the local head postmaster according to whatever system seemed best to them). So in this case 19 is simply the sub-office identifier in London E.C. for the King Street office.

Later, in 1917, the existing London districts were further subdivided into numbered areas (IIRC to aid the remaining sorters because a lot of staff had been called up for war service). These postal districts have the same "London <district><number>" form as the registration labels, but the numbers allocated have no connection.

There's another "gotcha" to watch out for with these registration sub-office indicators, btw -- large posters sending a lot of registered letters at a time (such as many companies, government departments, and other organisations) could be supplied with registration labels so that they could do most of the work themselves before taking them to the post office. Each of these posters was allocated a "sub-office" number, which bore no relation to the post office they took the registered letters to. So when you see high numbers, more than the number of post offices in the town or district, they're most likely from one of these large posters.

Unquote

So that is the light at the end of the tunnel.

Thanks to all contributors.

Regards
Ron.

Wow! Thanks Ron.
So 1907 for the King Street Branch Office.
I am off to dig into literature to establish this.
To date have been unable to locate King Street.

I am saving your post

Yes, I too fail to get a response from Allan.
I did note some years ago, he was, at that time, in poor health.
Such a great Philatelist for Brit Postmarks.

Rod, this area was heavily bombed during WWII. There is a listed building at the corner with Cheapside for which the records state it was damaged during the war. Google Maps' street view shows some modern buildings. This post office may have been destroyed during the war.