A-Z Of Great Scots
James Chalmers, the often overlooked inventor of the original postage stamp
Discover the tale of James Chalmers, the original inventor of the postage stamp
“Prepaid gummed labels ” might be the solution
CTHREE years before Sir Rowland Hill’s Penny Black revolutionised the way Britain sent its letters, an Arbroath man had invented the prepaid adhesive postage stamp.
In the history books, James Chalmers rarely gets credit for his brainwave, but now even Royal Mail acknowledges that he produced early versions of the sticky stamp.
And in Dundee, where he worked for most of his life, his grave in the Howff – a historic burial ground in the city centre – is quite clear on the matter.
It reads, “Originator of the adhesive postage stamp, which saved the penny postage scheme of 1840 from collapse, rendering it an unqualified success and which has since been adopted throughout the postal systems of the world.”
A weaver-turned-bookseller, James branched out into printing and publishing, and as his business grew, so did his passion for postal reform.
The dawdling mail coach between London and Scotland’s cities was a constant source of frustration. James came up with a plan to cut stops along the route, and convinced the Post Office to implement his ideas, shaving a whole day off a letter’s journey between the English and Scottish capitals.
It was a huge achievement – in fact, this very magazine reported in July 1825 that thanks to his changes, the mail system could “almost be termed perfect”. But there was still room for improvement in James’s eyes, particularly when it came to exorbitant postal costs.
In 1837, he wrote to Robert Wallace, MP for Greenock and a member of the Select Committee on Postage, suggesting that prepaid gummed labels might be the solution to Britain’s letter-sending woes. Sadly for James, around the same time, social reformer Rowland Hill was proposing the same idea as part of his groundbreaking Penny Post.
It’s Rowland’s name that everyone associates with the adhesive stamp which launched in 1840, but James’s son Patrick was determined to show that his father was its rightful inventor.
Rowland Hill’s son Pearson was also keen to defend his father’s honour, and the pair spent years bickering about it and exchanging retaliatory pamphlets. When they both died, their grandchildren continued the battle, but there’s never been a definitive winner.
Whether you’re Team James or Team Rowland, there’s no doubt that James Chalmers contributed greatly to postal reform. His thank you card is in the post.