Series
Post Office: Telegraphs, Private Companies
Catalogue reference: POST 81
What’s it about?
This record is about the Post Office: Telegraphs, Private Companies dating from 1845-1905.
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Full description and record details
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Reference (The unique identifier to the record described, used to order and refer to it)
- POST 81
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Title (The name of the record)
- Post Office: Telegraphs, Private Companies
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Date (When the record was created)
- 1845-1905
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Description (What the record is about)
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This series encompasses the surviving records of a number of early domestic and international telegraph companies which pioneered the development and growth of the public telegraph network.
Please see BT Archives online catalogue (under both POST 81 and TG ) and The Postal Museum's online catalogue for some descriptions of individual records within this series.
The records in this series reflect a former arrangement and have since been re-catalogued. Please contact BT Archives https://www.bt.com/about/bt/our-history/bt-archives for more information.
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Note (Additional information about the record)
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For general reference to the takeover of Private Telegaph Companies see POST 82
For information on the overseas aspect see POST 83
Catalogue entries below series level were removed from Discovery, The National Archives' online catalogue, in November 2016 because fuller descriptions were available in The Postal Museum's online catalogue and BT Archives online catalogue.
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Arrangement (Information about the filing sequence or logical order of the record)
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Note that these records have been rearranged to fit the scheme of arrangement used at BT Archives. The majority of the POST 81 reference numbers are now obsolete.
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Held by (Who holds the record)
- BT Group Archives
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Legal status (A note as to whether the record being described is a Public Record or not)
- Public Record(s)
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Language (The language of the record)
- English
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Physical description (The amount and form of the record)
- 122 file(s)
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Access conditions (Information on conditions that restrict or affect access to the record)
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Access conditions: Subject to 30 year closure
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Immediate source of acquisition (When and where the record was acquired from)
- Custodial history: The Post Office acquired these records when the private companies were taken over by the Postmaster General under the provisions of the Telegraph Acts, 1868 and 1869. This series of records, along with other Post Office telecommunications records, was transferred from the Post Office Archives to BT Archives in 1991.
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Administrative / biographical background (Historical or biographical information about the creator of the record and the context of its creation)
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The first of the early telegraph companies was the Electric Telegraph Company, founded in 1846 by Sir William Fothergill Cooke (one of the inventors of the telegraph) and a number of City financiers. Prior to the Post Office takeover in 1870, some of the companies had already amalgamated or been taken over by competitors. For example: the Electric Telegraph Company and the International Telegraph Company merged in 1855, and the London Telegraph Company formally changed its title to London and Provincial Telegraph Company in December 1857.
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Record URL
- https://beta.nationalarchives.gov.uk/catalogue/id/42510f14-6e2a-48f0-aeb6-528bf85c86ab/
Catalogue hierarchy
This record is held at BT Group Archives
Within the fonds: POST 81-88
Early development of telegraph and telephone services in the UK
You are currently looking at the series: POST 81
Post Office: Telegraphs, Private Companies