The Two Post Offices in Bromsgrove Road
There have been two Post Offices in Bromsgrove Road. The 1883 Ordnance Survey map shows a Post Office near the junction of Birmingham Road and Bromsgrove Road, approximately where no. 1 Bromsgrove Road is now. The 1881 census lists Sarah Wright aged 55 as the postmistress. The Wright family were running the Post Office since at least the 1861 census. Edward, then aged 70, was Sarah’s father and was the postmaster; she was the postmaster’s assistant. He previously had been a plumber and painter. Mary, his wife, was a shopkeeper in 1861. Sarah was listed as postmistress in the 1891 census.
Historical directories show this detailed data, when Sarah Wright was the postmistress in 1876 and 1892:
1876 Post Office Directory: – Post is delivered to the Hagley post office from Stourbridge in the morning and in the afternoon and collected in the morning and early evening.
1892 Kelly’s Directory – Post is delivered to the Hagley post office from Stourbridge in the morning and in the afternoon and collected in the morning and early evening. There is also a Sunday collection in the early evening.
By 1896 Martha Ann Boughton had become the subpostmistress and the 1901 census lists her, aged 36, as postmistress.
1896 Kelly’s Directory – Post is delivered to the Hagley post office from Stourbridge in the morning and in the afternoon and collected in the morning and early evening. There is also a Sunday collection in the early evening.
1900 Kelly’s Directory – Post is delivered to the Hagley post office from Stourbridge in the morning and in the afternoon and collected in the morning and early evening. There is now a Wall Letter Box in Birmingham Road which has a morning and evening collection and a Sunday morning collection.
The 1902 Ordnance Survey map shows a Post Office at what is now 20 Bromsgrove Road. The commemorative plaque on the building is shown below.
By 1905 Harold Price lived there and his wife Bertha was recorded as subpostmistress in the 1911 census. That census lists George W Powers as a postman. The Prices continued to live there until 1931. They were succeeded by Freda Mary Payne who is listed as P.O. clerk in the 1939 Register. Freda would have reached retirement age (60) in 1968 but still lived at 20 Bromsgrove Road until about 1975.
The building used for the Post Office changed to 6 and 8 Birmingham Road before 1972 and was in need of a new person to run it as reported in the April 1972 Hagley Village News.
SUB POST OFFICE BIRMINGHAM ROAD, HAGLEY
Regrettably the above Post Office will have to close unless someone comes
forward to fill the vacancy of Sub-Postmaster or Mistress. This closure could
cause inconvenience to the residents in top Hagley, therefore anyone interested
in this position should apply at once to the Assistant Head Postmaster, Mr.
Bedford, 200a, Wolverhampton Street, Dudley, DY1 1AA., or telephone Dudley
55680.
However, the May 1972 edition of Hagley Parish Magazine was able to report the following:
It seems that the Hagley Post Office will survive. We hope our note in the April edition helped.
To follow the story of the post office in Birmingham Road click here.