Charles E W Bean, Diaries, AWM38 3DRL 606/268/1 - 1917 - 1936 - Part 6

42.
were general and few specific instances were quoted. Whenever a 

complaint was set out in detail prompt enquiry was started, and 

in every case satisfactory reason was given for the non-receipt

of mail. It is generally realised that the time will never come
when complaints will cease altogether, and in relinquishing my
control of the Postal arrangements, I can confidently say that
there will never be less justification for adverse criticism than
at present.
Every postal item received is accounted for, being either
delivered to the addressee or returned to the sender except in
such cases as, in violation of the regulations. Officers Commanding
Units persist in distributing contents of parcels for absentees
among the men's comrades. I recommend that the strictest observance
of the regulations in this regard be insisted upon, or that
the regulations be absolutely abrogated, and at the same time the
people of Australia informed that such distribution is authorised,
and they must rest assured that the Postal work is faithfully
carried out in all other respects, and if mail is not delivered it
is for some good reason, which is not patent to them who are so
far away from the field of operations.
So far as parcels are concerned the reasons for nondelivery
are these:-
(a) Failure to despatch from Australia.
(b) Destruction by attrition in transit.
(c) Destruction of parcels themselves, and others
lying next by the decomposition of perishable
contents.
d) The obliteration of addresses, and
e) Distribution of contents among the comrades of
absentees from Units.
None of the first four cases can be controlled from England.
In the cases of (b) and (e) any articles contained
in these parcels are sent to the Comforts Funds, for the use
of A.I.F., soldiers generally.
A special Record system is needed for such work as is
done by the Australian Base Post Office, and one was inaugurated
from the outset. Theoretically the Post Office should lean on

43.
Base Records for means to readdress undeliverable mail matter,
and this should be forwarded regularly and promptly, but not
waiting for it to come in the usual course it was always sought 

by me both at Headquarters and at 3rd Echelon. Without wishing
to discredit the result of the work of the Officers of the Record
Section I am compelled to say that their records have proved over
and over again far behind the Post Office records which have the
advantage of personal notification from the soldiers themselves,
of changes in their location. A comparison of these by interchange
of records will prove my contention. Therefore I urge
that the valuable records of the Base Post Office be not disturbed.
The Postal system is working so smoothly that if it were
not for the unjustifiable complaints from Australia the fact that
it existed might easily be overlooked, but the complicated and
arduous nature of the work is quickly made plain on investigation.
Inspections of Departments have from time to time been
made by me and my Officers, the British Postal Officials, highly
placed Military Officers, and business men from Australia, and
these latter have resulted in the highest commendations on all
occasions.

Though I have been able to bring the machinery up to a
point where it should run smoothly and well, there is still in
prospect a good deal to exercise the judgement and energy of the
Director. Changes in composition and location of the forces
which have been constant will continue, but the principal matter
for consideration will be the arrangements when the repatriation,
of our troops at the conclusion of the war, begins. However, I
have confidence that whoever becomes Director will have the
valuable advice and support of the prominent Officers of the Corps.
I regret very much that I have felt constrained to ask
you to relieve me of my command. The work was interesting though
full of anxiety, and I would have been glad to have seen it through
to the end of the Campaign. The consideration which made me
decide finally to ask for relief was, that while two Officers

44.
were as I understand appointed to report on the working of the
Base Post Office, one of them in excess of his charter, proceeded
at once to take the control out of my hands, proposing drastic
innovations which were absolutely opposed to the recommendations
of my Officers and my own judgement. It will be recognised that
an Officer qualified to hold the important position of Director
would not for one moment retain responsibility while others practically
directed the work.
On my severance from the Service, I respectfully urge
that the loyalty and faithful discharge of their duty by members
of the A.I.F., Postal Corps might be fostered by occasional recognition
of the most deserving members which I have found has
been very seldom accorded.
C.S.Cunningham.
C.S.Cunningham Major.
D.A.P.S, A.I.FORCES.
LONDON.
16th. August 1917.

A.I.F. POSTAL SERVICE.
HISTORICAL
When the Commonwealth launched the great enterprise
which was to prove so successful in every respect in the War
the necessity for providing amply for handling letters, parcels,

newspapers etc. for the soldiers was evidently over looked.
It is true that a postal establishment was provide but it was 

totally inadequate for even the First Division to which it was 

attached and was in such a form that it could not be enlarged 

as the strength of the A.I.F. increased.
The Postal Section comprised only seven men under Staff

Sergt. A.W. Ross and was not equipped for the service that lay

ahead of it. The result was that the Staff Sergt. (afterwards

Captain Ross) had to improvise and shape his course without

assistance or anything to guide him. In this respect 

the Postal Corps was unique among the units of the A.I.F. His 

altogether too small staff soon found that most of the 24 hours 

each day were needed to cope with the work and in times of 

stress were not sufficient. The N.C.O. had none of the 

machinery or facilities of the Postal Section of the Royal 

Engineers which carried out the same duty for the British 

Army. At the outset the leader should have had commissioned 

ranked and his should have been an establishment on the lines 

of the Royal Engineers and capable of expansion. Furthermore, 

as was clearly demonstrated later, he should have been in 

close touch with Headquarters and entrusted with a certain 

amount of confidential information as to the contemplated 

changes in constitution and movement of troops. However the 

little postal section carried on in spite of its severe 

handicap and with surprising results.

When the A.I.F. embarked for Gallipoli the postal 

section accompanied it and the disembarkation and transport 

of its mails were undertaken by the British postal service. 

This arrangement was carried on until the beginning of June 

1915 when after consultation with British Headquarters the 

Commandant of the Australian Intermediate Base (General 

Sellheim) decided to establish an Australian Base Post Office 

at Alexandria with a staff of twenty men under Lieut. C.S. 

Cunningham who had been recently transferred to the Intermediate 

Base from Headquarters of the Fourth Infantry Brigade 

and who had fortunately had a thorough training in all 

branches of the Civil Postal Service.
Thus after nine months delay a step was taken which 

should have been one of the first in the formation of the 

Expeditionary Forces. That nine months' lack of proper 

organisation brought about a chaotic state of affairs which 

was intensified when the troops embarked from Egypt and a 

still more chaotic state of affairs when the wounded began to 

pour back into the country and were despatched for treatment 

to all parts as well as to Malta and Cyprus without a proper 

record being taken of their destination. It must be remembered 

that all this had occurred before Lieut. Cunningham's command 

had been thought of and while Staff Sergt. Rose and his little 

band were doing their utmost on Gallipoli backed only by two 

N.C.O's and two privates in Cairo. That then was the handicap 

allotted to the Aust. Postal Corps at its birth and the bitter 

complaints which naturally across both in the Field and in 

Australia damned the Corps before it began to function and gave 

it so bad a name that thereafter, not withstanding the contentment 

of the soldiers themselves, Press and people in Australia 

never rested from abusing it. The newspapers were mainly to 

blame for publishing general abuse by correspondents instead 

of opening its space to specific complaints which could be 

answered. The publication of these letters had a very serious

3.
effect on the minds of all Australians who had sons or brothers 

at the front, therefore protests were despatched from A.I.F. 

Headquarters from time to time. Direct protests were made too 

directly to the newspapers conspicuous in fault for this 

calamity. The reply of The Argus was that seeing that Lieut. 

Cunningham was the head of the postal service it could not 

possibly refuse to publish whatever groundless abuse was offered 

to it regarding the work of the Unit. That the complains were 

groundless is completely demonstrated in the Despatches 

sent from the A.I.F. to the Defence Department again and again.
Well the Australian Base Post Office began its 

career on June 5, 1915. The provision of accommodation was 

to be made by the D.A.P.S., M.E.F. The only Office accommodation 

he was able to provide was half a Custom shed on the quay at 

Alexandria, a long dark building without ventilation, water 

supply, light or latrine services, and altogether too small for 

the amount of mail to be handled. Further, the other half of 

this shed which was not in any way partitioned off was occupied 

by a portion of the British Postal Section, and when the latter 

ceased work the building was closed and the Australian business 

had to be at a standstill.
On taking up duty the Officer Commanding the Australian 

Base Post Office at once pressed the D.A.P.S., M.E.F., for 

better accommodation, but in spite of daily representations 

it was not until July 26th, nearly two months later, that the 

proper accommodation was obtained by the conversion of an old 

theatre in Alexandria. On the date that occupation was entered 

into a mail from Australia arrived which would have filled the 

old Office completely leaving no room for fittings or staff. 

The conditions in the old office were such that there was a 

daily sick parade of six men out of the twenty constituting the 

staff. It was soon apparent that the authorised strength was 

altogether insufficient for the work and men were obtained from 

the Details Camp at Mustapha, until the total number of men

 4. 
employed was 90. The D.A.P.S, M.E.F., in a report on the work 

urged that this number should be at once increased to 130 which 

was accordingly done.
The mails from Australia were landed at Suez and sent by train 

to Cairo for such Units as were still in that area, but the bulk 

of the mail which was for the Force in Gallipoli, was sent to 

Alexandria for despatch. The increased staff was able to deal 

with this mail, but as a result of operations in Gallipoli the 

undeliverable mail began to flow in in tremendous bulk. It was 

dealt with in Units and redirected according to information 

obtained by lists from the many Hospitals in Egypt and such information 

as could be got from the 3rd Echelon. The difficulties 

with which the 3rd Echelon met in locating men evacuated from 

Gallipoli to Egypt, Malta, Cyprus and England are well known, 

and it will be understood that the Base Post Office was absolutely 

unable to locate addresse^(e)s. However, the work was carried on 

and redirected letters were sent to the various places at which 

wounded and sick Australian soldiers were known to be situated.
In August of 1915 there were 189,000 letters and a great 

number of parcels on hand, the addressees of which could not be 

traced by rRecords. These, however, were gradually redirected and 

sent on as returns from Hospitals were obtained. It was afterwards 

found that the Postal Orderlies of Hospitals outside the 

control of the Australian Base Post Office were not returning 

letters for Australian soldiers who had been discharged from those 

institutions but were holding on to them. This was particularly 

the case at Malta where, as a result of representations by the 

Officer Commanding Australian Base Post Office, and Officer of the 

British Administration at the Island made an investigation and found 

an accumulation of 3,000 letters. These were promptly returned to 

the Australian Base Post Office and readdressed from the material 

which had come to hand in the meantime.
It is notorious that at this time wounded mend had ben sent from 

Gallipoli to the various countries without system and their location 

was a matter of most serious difficulty.

 5.
The experience gained in the handling of returned undeliverable 

mail at this time was of the greatest value and though 

the results obtained would not compare at all favourably with the 

presentlater achievements the heads of the British Administration and 

the Egyptian Civilian Administration, who inspected the work 

declared that they could not suggest any improvement in the office 

or work. They were surprised at the bulk of the mails handled. 

From day to day as the conditions changed, new methods were adopted 

to meet them and the work was moving along with fair regularity 

when in December of 1915 in the midst of the Christmas rush the 

Australian Force was withdrawn from Gallipoli to Egypt. The rearrangement 

rendered necessary by this move was completely under way 

when the splitting up of Units to create new Divisions was carried 

out. The effect of this splitting up was to render the letters for 

half the Australian Force absolutely unaddressed. A conference was 

held at A.I.F. Headquarters in Cairo at which were present General 

Sellheim (Commandant) General C.B.B. White, General Carruthers, 

Colonel Anderson, A.Q.M.G., Captain Fisher, D.A.P.S., A.I.F., 

Lieutenant Cunningham O.C., A.B.P.O., and Lieutenant McCurdy, O.C.

N.Z Postal Services. An attempt was made to evolve a method of 

dealing with the letters for the men who had been transferred from 

the Units to which their letter were addressed and for the reinforcements 

which were then arriving. The only scheme which was 

thought of at all practicable was to send the mails in the first place 

to the Unit as addressed so that the mail for the personnel remaining 

with the parent Unit might be selected and the balance returned to 

the Base Post Office in order that it could be then submitted to 

the new Unit partly formed by the half of the parent Unit. At the 

same time a number of the Postal Staff were detailed to attend the 

3rd Echelon to make out Nominal Rolls of all men transferred from 

original Units which could be used int he Redirection Department 

of the Base Post Office which had no grown to such an extent that 

it dealt with practically half the mail coming from Australia, 

instead of about 10 or 15 per cent which had been the average 

before the creation of the new units. This task was difficult

 6.
enough at the outset but it was intensified when the contingent 

moved from Egypt to France; then the mails were submitted to the 

parent of offspring Unit whichever remained in Egypt and the 

residue was sent across to France. Of this residue there was much 

mail for men supported to be on French soil, but who had not actually 

been transferred. Their mail added to the returns resulting from 

casualties were sent down to 3rd Echelon at Rouen for redirection 

but it was found there absolutely impossible to cope with the mass.
Before the transference of the bulk of the A.I.F. from 

Egypt to France a new establishment was issues and for the first 

time (1916) Australian soldiers were afforded a service on the lines 

of the Royal Engineers Postal Section. Lieut. Cunningham was made 

Director of Army Postal Service with the rank of Captain, later that 

of Major, and commissioned rank was given to the heads of sections 

whose responsibilities had long been too great for men of N.C.O. 

rank.
In June 1916 the Australian Base Post Office was removed 

to London. It was August before the records which had been made 

in Egypt were co-ordinated with the addresses which the High 

Commissioner's staff had been recording in England. A card system 

was arranged in alphabetical order.
By the time this was completed, 474,000 letters had been 

received from 3rd Echelon, Rouen, and 239,000 others which were 

undeliverable as addressed had flowed in from Units. The Re-direction 

Staff was increased and reorganised to meet this problem and for 

the first time there was a prospect of starting un-interrupted work. 

It was possible to obtain returns and nominal rolls with something 

like thoroughness and with the aid of these not only was a daily 

inflow of from 15,000 to 20,000 letters matched by the despatch of 

redirected letters, but the bulk was gradually reduced, until 

5. 11. 16 when there was an estimated residue of only 155,000 

undelivered letters. That week 161,000 were redirected and despatched.

7.
THE FOLLOWING TABLE SHOWS THE PROGRESS OF WORK IN REDIRECTION DEPARTMENT FROM 17.8.16 -
WEEKLY from 17.9.16.

Date	Number of hand	Period	Number Received	Number Despatched
17.8.16	662,650
17.9.16	712,950	17.8.16 to 17.9.16	480,100	429,800
24.9.16	662,800	17.9.16 to 24.9.16	112,000	162,150
1.10.16	566,175	24.9.16 to 1.10.16	115,000	211,625
8.10.16	445,950	1.10.16 to 8.10.16	101,000	221,225
15.10.16	365,450	8.10.16 to 15.10.16	142,000	222,500
22.10.16	298,000	15.10.16 to 22.10.16	154,000	221,450
29.10.16	199,000	22.10.16 to 29.10.16	132,000	231,000
5.11.16	155,000	29.10.16 to 5.11.16	137,000	181,000

As the Force in France increased and the unfortunate casualties 

were more numerous the daily return of undeliverable letters from 

France amounted to an average of 30,000 per day for the seven days of 

the week, as well as a proportionate number of parcels.
The following is an outline of the procedure formerly carried 

out in connection with the handling of mails for reinforcements from 

the time of their arrival in the United Kingdom, and the present 

system had been institude to meet new conditions and requirements 

regarding this particular section. Mails from Australia arriving at 

Australian Base Post Office were forwarded to the Training Camps. 

If the addressee was not there they were forwarded to the Divisional 

Base Depots, thence to Units in the Field, and if undeliverable were 

returned to the Australian Base Post Office. If not change of address 

was on record the letter was tried at various places at which the 

addressee was thought most likely to be located.