Pre-Stamp, How did Post Offices know what to Charge ?

When an item of mail was posted, the Postmaster or a clerk at the Post Office where the item was posted wrote the postal charge on the front. If the postage had been prepaid the charge was written in red ink, otherwise it was in black. Each Post Office needed to know what to charge when an item was posted, whatever the destination. By the 1800s at least (and maybe before) each Post Office was provided with a printed book or a large printed sheet for wall display, probably both, at least for the larger offices. These books or wall charts listed every post town and "principal place" in the country, with blank columns for local postmasters to fill in the charge from his own town and, in the case of the wall charts, also the towns through which letters should be routed (not always London).

"A List of Post Towns and Principal Places; with the full Postage of a Single Letter to and from Falmouth according to the actual Routes of the Post"

Not many have survived, in part because such books and charts would have been useless once they were out of date and it would have been dangerous to have them still around when a new set of rates came into force. Postmasters were probably instructed to return or destroy any such outdated material so as to prevent the wrong rates being used. The illustration above shows a portion of a wall chart for Falmouth from sometime between 1812 and 1823.

On 6^th November 1813, Christopher Saverland, Packet Agent and Postmaster of Falmouth wrote to Francis Freeling, Secretary to the P.M.G.:

"Please send half a dozen lists with London and cross post postage filled up" [Post 48]

Given the quantity requested it seems possible that each Receiving House was to be given a copy; they must have had this postal rate information available otherwise people would not have been able to prepay their postage if they so desired.

It is unclear who actually completed these columns in the books or wall charts. It may have been done centrally or possibly it was a task that the G.P.O. would have delegated to local postmasters who might be better placed to handle it than the London office. The letter above implies that it was done centrally (at least on request).

There were also publications for the general public published for His (or Her) Majesty's Stationery Office, which itemised the postage from London to all Post Towns and Principal Places, like the one shown below from 1830.

Sample page.