Signalling The Mail 1866-1899
A pennant system for signalling the mails was approved by the Resident in May 1866 and used experimentally from November that year, pending approval from the Postmaster General in Bombay, which was forthcoming in January 1867.
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The harbourmaster was responsible for announcing the sighting of a mail Packet as it approached Aden harbour and when the service to the Cape via Zanzibar was introduced in December 1872 he issued a notice that the signal to be hoisted at the various signal stations would be the letter F in the commercial code (a white ball on a red pennant) together with the usual time signal indicating at what time the Zanzibar mail would close. He helpfully added that a booklet on signal codes could be bought from his office for six Annas each.
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Only three days later the code letter was changed to the letter G, a yellow and blue flag. The nautically-minded reader will have realised that these code letters were different from those in the 1931 International Code of Signals, Visual, in use today. The first International (Commercial) Code of Signals was introduced in 1857, being updated on 1st January 1901. The 1857 Code consisted of only 18 flags, compared to 26 in 1901 and the 40 in the 1931 Code which came into effect on 1st January 1934.
The Flagstaff
At night signal guns were fired to announce the sighting of the more important mail packets. In some instances coloured lights were also shown. A Notice advised the community that from 1st December 1879 the following signals would be made at night:
For the P & O mail to and from Bombay: At the lightship 3 guns in quick succession, repeated at Marshag and Sham Shum by 2 guns in quick succession.
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For the Messageries Maritimes mail to and from Suez: At the lightship 2 guns, repeated by one gun at Marshag and Sham Shum.
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The P & O mail steamer to and from Calcutta would be signalled as before viz: At the lightship one gun would be fired and one blue and one white light shown at the ensign staff. This signal was not to be repeated at any of the other stations.
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Two of the most important routine events of the week at Aden were the arrival of the weekly P&O mail steamers, one from Bombay and the other from Europe via Suez. Once Perim had been connected to Aden by cable, and bearing in mind that it then took the packet another six hours to reach Aden, it meant that advance warning could be given of the estimated time of arrival at Aden of the mail steamer for Bombay.
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From the number of letters on the subject and the periodic rockets given to the Assistant Resident at Perim for the all-important cable not being sent, or being sent late, it would seem that there was an element of paranoia on the subject, but not for the reasons one might imagine. Notice was needed not so that letters from ‘home’ could be collected as soon as possible, but so that official and business letters could be timed to catch the outgoing mail, bearing in mind that Aden was administratively under Bombay. This warning system dates from July 1886 when the Resident sent a telegram to the Assistant at Perim ordering him in future to cable the time the steamer with mail for India passed Perim.
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It took time for the system to work efficiently. Some mail steamers were not being recognised as they passed Perim and in September that year the P&O ordered captains of outward mail steamers to hoist the English Mail pennant during daylight at the foremast and at night to show two vertical lights, the same as mail steamers were doing when entering Aden Harbour. On other occasions the Eastern Telegraph Company (ETC) failed to pass the cable immediately; this brought the order from Aden that a Register be kept by the ETC as correct and timely signalling of the mail was of public importance.
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In December 1886 the P&O had to clarify their orders to captains that the Directors’ instructions must be strictly carried out and the English Mail pennant (red with three white crosses) was to be flown and that the Royal Mail bargee was not to be flown at the same time. This was necessary as other mail steamers, for example those carrying the Australia Mail, also passed Perim.
On receipt of the cable from Perim giving the time the steamer passed, the P & O flew a number of flags from their masthead at Steamer Point. In January 1899 a notice was issued to better define the time the steamer had passed Perim if it had done so in daylight. As well as the Royal Mail flag, a flag to indicate the hour would also be hoisted, plus a pennant to denote a.m. or p.m.; the a.m. pennant was alternate red and white stripes (three red and two white) and the p.m. pennant a white circle on a blue background. The a.m. pennant flown without an hour pennant would signify that the mail steamer had passed Perim at noon.
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Two footnotes were added to the notice: in black heavy type that the mail steamer could be expected at Aden six hours after passing Perim and another in red that these signals had nothing whatsoever to do with the hour the mail would close at the Post Office.
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In addition to the notification by P & O of the hour a mail steamer passed Perim there was also the official government system of advising the Aden community that the mail steamer had been sighted, that based on the firing of saluting guns, mentioned above. On 12th July 1886 one of the signals was changed: in future four guns would be fired at the lightship when the Bombay Mail was sighted. Following representations from those working and living in Crater that this signal was of no earthly use to them, a relay system was introduced whereby the lookouts on top of Sham Shum and at Marshag would each fire three guns.
It is noted that in 1892 the warning signal for when the mail steamer from Bombay arrived at night was still three guns fired at the light vessel and two each at Marshag and Sham Shum [Shamsan]. The Port Officer also complained that mail steamers were often not hoisting the ‘Mail’ flag until well within the harbour limits.
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This was important as the mail bag for India closed in the post office in Camp half an hour after the signal guns had been fired and at the main post office in Steamer Point one and a half hours after. This was because the mail contract only allowed for a four-hour stay in Aden. [Hence the booklet for passengers ‘Three Hours in Aden’ mentioned in the article ‘Aden 1906’]