Pearson Hill Cancelling Machine (Replica), 1991

Accession number: OB1996.0396

This replica of the Pearson Hill Cancelling Machine was commissioned in 1991 by the then National Postal Museum to mark its 25th anniversary.

The original, developed by Pearson Hill in 1857 was arguably the earliest mechanised part of the postal system. No examples of the original machines survive.

Pearson Hill was the son of Rowland Hill whose postal reform in 1840 created the need to mechanise the post to cope with the increased usage.

Pearson worked with the Post Office to develop machines to automatically cancel stamps and thus speed up the processing of the mail.