A Visit to a Post Office in 1852
by Bob Brail

            Although emails and texts have changed the way people communicate today, a lot of folks still look forward to getting their mail each day.  Even though a lot of today’s mail is of the third class variety, the daily walk to the mailbox remains important to many Americans.  Of course, even today many Americans must visit the post office to get their mail.  This was also true in America before home delivery.  In 1852 the residents of Femme Osage Township were served by three post offices: Missouriton, Augusta, and Femme Osage.  The Boone-Duden Historical Society possesses the postmaster’s ledger for the Femme Osage post office for the early part of the 1850’s, including the first three months of 1852.  This ledger, along with some information gleaned from the 1852 Missouri Census, allows some interesting insights into life in rural St. Charles County in the decade before the Civil War.

            Before discussing any insights, however, it is necessary to describe the contents of the census.  The 1852 Missouri census names only the heads of families.  It totals the number of white males and females in five age categories, and it also gives total number of slaves for each gender of each slave-owning household.  Finally, the census states the number of whites in each household who could read and write.  This makes it possible, for example, to determine that the literacy rate in slave-owning homes was 75%, but only 65% in households where no slaves were owned.    

           

            In 1852 the white population of Femme Osage Township was 1751 persons living in 316 households; forty-eight of these families owned slaves.  It is impossible to know exactly how many persons were served by each of the three post offices in the township, but a general estimate obviously is thirty-three percent.  This would mean that the number of persons served by the Femme Osage post office was approximately 585 people living in 105 households (an assumption is being made that no slaves sent or received mail).  On the average every household had at least one literate person, eighty-seven households had a literacy rate of at least fifty percent, and thirty-one households were one hundred percent literate. 

            Compared to today, the people of Femme Osage sent and received few letters.  In the first three months of 1852, only ninety-seven letters were mailed to destinations within the United States.  This computes to an average of one person out of six sending only one letter in three months.  Almost all of these letters were posted to other places in Missouri.  The most common locations were St. Louis (thirty-three letters), St. Charles (fifteen), Jefferson City (eight), Augusta (five), Washington, D.C. (five), Pinckney (four), and Fee Fee (four).  Postage for letters sent overseas totaled $3.80 ($115 in current dollars), but the ledger does not identify destinations of those letters.

            Receiving a letter in 1852 was even more unusual than sending one!  In the same three months, only sixty-three letters were received from locations within the United States.  It is safe to say that folks around Femme Osage in 1852 rarely received letters.  On the average only one person out of nine received just one letter in the first three months of 1852.  Twenty-seven of these letters were sent from either St. Louis or St. Charles.  Warrenton and Fee Fee each sent four.  Four were also received from three different towns in Virginia. 

            What is most interesting, though, is the page of the ledger entitled “Newspapers and Pamphlets received at the Post Office.”  The postmaster was required to itemize by name, number of subscribers, and frequency of issue of every periodical that passed through his post office.  While this ledger does not identify who subscribed to each periodical, it provides a fascinating look at what the people of Femme Osage were reading in 1852.

            Not surprisingly, they were mostly reading newspapers and magazines written in German.  About seventy-five percent of the total number of subscriptions was to German-language publications.  The periodical with the greatest number of subscribers, thirty-two, was a monthly publication, the Messenger of Peace.  Started in 1850, this St. Louis periodical was published in German by the Kirchenverein, an organization of German Evangelical congregations in the St. Louis area, including the church at Femme Osage.  It tended to support Republicans and held anti-slavery views.  The second most common periodical (twenty-one households) was the St. Charles Demokrat.  This weekly German-language newspaper was founded by Francis Krekell in 1852, so these twenty-one households must have been charter subscribers.  This newspaper printed articles on politics, business, literature, and the arts, and also held anti-slavery views. Twelve households subscribed to the weekly Anzieger des Westens, the first German-language newspaper in St. Louis, making it the third most favorite publication in Femme Osage.  It was founded in 1835 by Christian Bimpage, and in the 1840’s it had the largest circulation of any newspaper in Missouri.  In 1852 its editor was Carl Daenzer, and it was noted for its editorials against the Know Nothing Party, which opposed immigrants and Catholics.

            It is also not surprising to see that many of the publications dealt with the explosive issue of slavery.  The types of newspapers and pamphlets read by Femme Osage persons in 1852 reflect the division that made Missouri a divided state during the Civil War.  Several periodicals were outspoken in their opposition to slavery.  Besides the previously mentioned Messenger of Peace, St. Charles Demokrat, and Anzieger des Westerns, other publications like the English-language Jefferson City Enquirer (two subscribers) editorialized against slavery.  It was noteworthy for its support of Senator Thomas Hart Benton, who was at that time unpopular in Missouri because of his anti-slavery views. 

            Pro-slavery newspapers and pamphlets were also delivered to the residents of Femme Osage.  The monthly Southern Ladies’ Companion (one household) was the publication of the Methodist Episcopal Church South.  Printed each month in Nashville, the Companion was one result of the split that had occurred within the Methodist Church in 1844 when its southern churches broke away.  Another newspaper with pro-slavery views was the St. Louis Missouri Republican (two subscribers) which was issued every week.  The St. Louis Intelligencer was a third publication which supported slavery.  Founded in 1850, it was a relatively new periodical.  All three of these publications were published in English.

            Perhaps even less surprising is that forty percent of the subscriptions were for religious magazines.  At the top of the list was the aforementioned Messenger of Peace with its thirty-two subscribers.  Others included the German Church-Friend, a monthly newspaper from Mercerburg, Pennsylvania, which had two subscribers; the Herald of Religious Liberty, a weekly publication of the Presbyterian Church, which had one subscriber; and the Western Watchman, a weekly periodical of the Baptist Church, which also had a single subscriber.

            The names of the publications in the Femme Post ledger of 1852 also indicate several other interests.  Four households received the English-language Saturday Evening Post.  Begun in 1821, this Philadelphia journal described itself as “a family newspaper, neutral in politics, devoted to morality, pure literature, foreign and domestic news, agriculture, the commercial interests, science, art and amusement.”  Two households received the Western Journal and Civilian, published monthly in English in St. Louis.  It called itself a journal of human improvement and described itself as “devoted to agriculture, manufactures, mechanic arts, internal improvement, commerce, public policy, and polite literature.”  There was even one household in Femme Osage that subscribed to the Philadelphia publication called Graham’s American Monthly Magazine of Literature, Art and Fashion.  The first editor of Graham’s was Edgar Allan Poe, and his short story “Murders in the Rue Morgue,” one of the earliest detective stories ever written, had been published in this magazine.

            There were even subscriptions to what today might be called professional journals. The American Journal of the Medical Sciences and the Medical News, both printed in Philadelphia, each were sent to one household served by the Femme Osage post office.  Could they both have been sent to the home of Dr. Elijah P. Toney, a physician who lived in Femme Osage Township in 1852?  Certainly that is a strong possibility.

            It is still true today that our mail, even the “junk mail” variety, tells a lot about who we are and what interests us.  By taking a close look at the Femme Osage postmaster’s ledger and Missouri census of 1852, we can also come to a partial understanding of the residents of Femme Osage Township in the decade before the Civil War.

Sources: 1852 Missouri State Census; 1905 St. Charles County Atlas; chroniclingamerica. loc.gov; Femme Osage Post Office Ledger, 1852 (Boone-Duden Historical Society archives); friedens-peaceucc.org;  historyengine.richmond.edu/episodes/view/4272; “History of the Femme Osage Post Office” (Boone-Duden Historical Society archives); History of Nashville (books.google.com);  legendsofkansas.com/slavery3;  psmag.com/blogs/the-101/a-short-history-of-mail-delivery-52444; spartacus-educational.com; statehistoricalsocietyofmissouri.org; stlmediahistory.com; wikipedia.org.