Moorland mail
The postcard that kicked off a sport…
‘ THOSE DESIROUS OF investigating the Moor apply to the above,’ the advert reads. In the 19th century few dare venture into Dartmoor’s interior without a guide – and James Perrott is the one to get.
In 1854 he tucks a bottle in a cairn by Cranmere Pool, in a remote, spongy area from which the Rivers Tavy, Taw, Dart and Okement ooze. Then he adds his calling card: whoever finds it can get in touch, and leave their own card. In 1888, it’s replaced by a tin in which visitors leave a self-addressed postcard; the next walker takes it home to post it – so one day, who knows when, mail will arrive from the moor. Letterboxing is born.
It takes a good while for the sport to spread: 40 years until another box at Taw Pool and a further 44 for one at Ducks Pool, but now there are hundreds hidden among Devon’s tors and mires, with rubber stamps and visitor books to record your trip, rather than postcards.
But first you have to find them.
A Catalogue of Dartmoor Letterboxes (letterboxingondartmoor.com) lists many. Some have directions and grid references, but some only cryptic clues, adding to the fun of the treasure hunt.
Perrott lived to the age of 80, dying on this day in 1895, never knowing how letterboxing, and its close cousin geocaching, will take off.
“…he tucks a bottle in a cairn by Cranmere Pool, in a remote, spongy area from which the Rivers Tavy, Taw, Dart and Okement ooze.”