There are approximately 100,000 photographs in The Royal Mail Archive. The earliest is from the late 19th century and the latest ones date from the 1990s.
The majority of our photographs come from the photograph library created by the Post Office. It began to grow with the start of the Public Relations Department in the 1930s. It provided material for posters, training material and particularly for the Post Office Magazine. It is this group of photographs that are currently available to search on our Online Catalogue.
The production of the Post Office Magazine stopped during the Second World War. The photograph library, however, still contains many photographs documenting the impact of the war on Post Office services.
Examples from our Collection
Here are some examples of photographs from our collection: