English Parish Church Postcards
Historical Background

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History

The modern British pictorial postcard is part of a tradition stretching back to September 1894. This is the date that the Royal Mail first permitted the sending of illustrated cards (the US postal service was delivering postcards by 1870). Publishers already had material to draw upon, since the famous Francis Frith (1822-1898), for example, had been busy recording locations in Britain since the 1850s. His ambition was to photograph every town and village in the land, plus all the churches, stately homes, etc. His work was carried on by his sons after his death in 1898. By this time 40,000 glass negatives were in the collection and these views were to be seen on many postcards well into this century. Frith postcards were sold through some two thousand tobacconists and newsagents throughout Britain.

Postcard Centenary 1870 - 1970
First Day Cover commemorating the centenary of the postcard in Great Britain
1st October 1870 - 1st October 1970

Brighton
Postcard Centenary 1894 - 1994
Two First Day Covers issued on 12th April 1994 commemorating the centenary of the pictorial postcard in Great Britain 1894 - 1994

Dating Frith's Postcards to 1940

Postcards up to number 18520 were taken prior to 1886. From 1886, the starting number for each subsequent year is as follows:

Number Year   Number Year   Number Year
18521 1886 51142 1904 71721 1922
19500 1887 53180 1905 73333 1923
20475 1888 55341 1906 75416 1924
21450 1889 57201 1907 76667 1925
22421 1890 59460 1908 79014 1926
28140 1891 61298 1909 79313 1927
29865 1892 62187 1910 80652 1928
31590 1893 63077 1911 81599 1929
33315 1894 64058 1912 82990 1930
35040 1895 65149 1913 83725 1931
37121 1896 66516 1914 84911 1932
38962 1897 67714 1915 85424 1933
40804 1898 67868 1916 86015 1934
42852 1899 67894 1917 86471 1935
44900 1900 68020 1918 87164 1936
46320 1901 68796 1919 87845 1937
48082 1902 69357 1920 88252 1938
49125 1903 69918 1921 88855 1939

... and for 1940 the starting number was 88958.

Queen Victoria, King Edward VII & King George V

First Day of Issue
1 January 1902: the first day of issue of the King Edward VII ½d postage stamp [SGC 215 & 217] which was used on tens of millions of postcards in the first decade of the "Golden Age" until replaced by the George V ½d postage stamp [SGC 325 - see below] on 22 June 1911, the date of his coronation
22 June 1911: George V Coronation
Penny Postage Jubilee: 1840 to 1890

The Collection

The purpose of this collection of postcards of English parish churches - which now numbers over 8,231 - is to provide local and family historians with a databank of old (Victorian and Edwardian) church images with which they can illustrate their research:

County CCC No   County CCC No
Bedfordshire BDF 43 Leicestershire LEI 70
Berkshire BRK 175 Lincolnshire LIN 232
Buckinghamshire BKM 146 London LND 69
Cambridgeshire CAM 72 Middlesex MDX 260
Cheshire CHS 153 Norfolk NFK 218
Cornwall CON 315 Northamptonshire NTH 122
Cumberland CUL 79 Northumberland NBL 95
Derbyshire DBY 128 Nottinghamshire NTT 73
Devon DEV 488 Oxfordshire OXF 175
Dorset DOR 148 Rutland RUT 12
Durham DUR 85 Shropshire SAL 95
Essex ESS 320 Somerset SOM 361
Gloucestershire GLS 210 Staffordshire STS 107
Hampshire HAM 300 Suffolk SFK 234
Herefordshire HEF 68 Surrey SRY 376
Hertfordshire HRT 130 Sussex SSX 600
Huntingdonshire HUN 28 Warwickshire WAR 183
Isle of Man IOM 8 Westmorland WES 48
Isle of Wight IOW 96 Wiltshire WIL 164
Kent KEN 554 Worcestershire WOR 127
Lancashire LAN 311 Yorkshire YKS 754
Total 8231

For a copy of any church postcard in the collection (in .gif, .jpg or .tiff image format) complete and submit the following form using the information for that card which appears on the relevant web page:

The Dioceses of the Church of England
County:
Parish:
Description:
Publisher:
Type:
Year:
Image Format:




The Language of Stamps

A few of the postcards in the collection have a footnote which makes reference to a "possible language of stamps". In Victorian and Edwardian times love letters were censored by the lovers' families. Fortunately, Post Office regulations did not direct the placement and orientation of postage stamps allowing a secret "Sweetheart Code" to be developed by means of which the correspodents could indicate their affections by placing and orientating the stamp on the postcard or envelope in accordance with that Code:

Language of Stamps

James Joyce makes passing reference to the Code in Ulysses, which Joyce started writing in 1906 but which he did not finish until February 1921. The entire 732-page work takes place on Thursday, 16 June 1904 and the following short excerpt is from the inner thoughts of Molly Bloom …

"I near jumped out of my skin I wanted to pick him up when I saw him following me along the Calle Real in the shop window then he tipped me just in passing I never thought he'd write making an appointment I had it inside my petticoat bodice all day reading it up in every hole and corner while father was up at the drill instructing to find out by the handwriting or the language of stamps singing I remember shall I wear a white rose and I wanted to put on the old stupid clock to near the time he was the first man kissed me under the Moorish wall my sweetheart …"

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