Dragon Stamps issued in July 1878, which was the first set of stamps
issued in the period when post was operated by the Qing Customs
Section 2 Customs Post
A. From concurrently in charge of post delivery to setting up post on trial
Post belongs to important national authority and should be operated by China itself. China needed modern post, which was different from ancient post, with advantages that it delivered both official documents and private letters. After "Tianjin Treaty", "Be1Jing Treaty" were signed, UK, France, Russia and USA set up their Embassies in Beijing in 1861. At the beginning, their mails were transferred by the department of foreign and trade affairs- the Prime Office, to China Post for delivery. After 1865, General Customs Duty Department, which was directly managed by foreigners, was moved to Beijing. Whose mails were also transferred in the same way. These letters were sent and received between Shanghai and Beijing. Because "Taiping Army" and "Nian Army" were active in several provinces in south and north China, wars were endless. The Prime Office was afraid of being responsible for the safety of those letters, and handed delivery of those letter to the customs. By then, Robert Hart, the British who was the General Customs Duty Administrator had already the intention of operating China Post, and accepted to undertake it with pleasure. He set up post offices in customs of Beijing, Shanghai, Zhenjiang to deliver embassy documents and official and private mails of the customs. In 1868, post office of Tianjin Customs also sent and received overseas mails. To run post delivery concurrently by customs was the embryonic form of modern China Post, which laid foundation for concurrently operating post by custom later.
In 1876, as a assistant of Li Hongzhang, Robert Hart attended the negotiation with Thomas Francis Wade, the British Envoy in China in Yantai. On that time, Hart suggested to include the item that China Post would be operated by British into "Yantai Treaty". Wade didn't adopted his suggestion. But Hart got support from Li Hongzhang. Li Hongzhang encouraged Hart to set up customs post as a trial and promised to ask for the Emperor's approval to change customs post into national post the trial succeeded. In 1878, after discussing with Li Hongzhang and asking for the approval of the Prime Office, Hart set up post by customs as a trial. Hart instructed G.Detring, duty officer of Tianjin Customs, to establish post offices in Beijing, Tianjin, Yantai, Niuzhuang (Yingkou), Shanghai with Tianjin Customs as the center. On March 23, 1878, G. Detring asked the Register Department of Shanghai Customs to print stamps of 3 fen and 5 fen, and I fen later. 5 fen stamps were for mail delivery between Beijing and Tianjin, 1 fen stamps were used for delivery of newspapers. This was the beginning of formal issue and use of stamps in China. The patterns on the 3 kinds of stamps were all dragons, so they were called "Dragon Stamp" later.
Dragon Stamps
issued in July 1878, which was the first set of stamps
issued in the period when post was operated by the Qing Customs
After the trial of operating post by customs, under the support of Li Hongzhang, G. Detring decided through discussion with China Merchant Company, Yihe Ship Company, Taigu Ship Company to carry customs mails in priority and for free. Because the 3 ports of Tianjin, Yantai, Niuzhuang were frozen in winter, ships couldn't navigate, G.Detring organized winter land team to handle the post. There were 3 routes: one was Tianjin-Shanhaiguan, Niuzhuang route, one was Tianjin-Qihe-Yantai route, the other was Tianjin-Qihe-Zhenjiang route. Vehicles were mule, horse and boat. After mails on Tianjin-Zhenjiang route arrived Zhenjiang via land by land team, they would be transferred to Shanghai. It formed a major postal route together with original Tianjin-Beijing cavalry team.
After the customs operated post on trial, due to limited number of post organizations, civilian's mails were still handed to public post office to deliver. Post delivery Problem couldn't be solved only by customs man-power. To enlarge the delivery of public mails and compete with public post office, G. Detring suggested to Hart that the customs established another post organization: "Huayang Post Office" and aPPOinted Wu Huan, a Chinese official of Beijing General Administration of Duty, Wu Huan as the administrator. After Wu Huan took over, he constructed "Huayang Post Office" in Tianjin and Shanghai by cooperating with Tianjin Dachang Trading Company, and invited tenders for stock-share. Wu Huan Planned to set up "Huayang Post Offices" in large cities all over the country with Shanghai as the center to engage in all post business within China. His plan got support from official Shen Baozhen. Wu Huan asked Zhenjiang Customs for setting up a post office in Zhenjiang. James Twinem, Duty Official of Zhenjing Customs signed the document and tender regulations. Zhenjiang Customs supervisor reported it to Shen Baozhen who immediately approved to carry out and dispatched to each customs along Yangtze River. According to Wu Huan's plan, it could developed to large-scale commercial operated post, which was opposite to the intention of Hart and G.Detring. Hart immediately discharged James Twinem from his post and dismissed Wu Huan from the customs. After the failure of Hart's plan, he set up another post organization inside customs which was named "Customs Post Office" in 1880 and Promoted it in Southern areas and ports along Yangtze River. By the beginning o f 1886, customs post offices were set up in 24 Places where there were customs. "The Customs Post Office Regulations" issued in Nov, 1882 announced that post would improve services and open to all senders. A new modern post system stood firm at last and created conditions for the development of postal service.
B. Slow development of post on trial
From 1878 when customs tried to set up post to 1896 when the Qing Post was established, modern China Post had experienced many vicissitudes. Within l & years, the number of post offices increased from 5 to 24 Post offices were set up only in places where there were customs. There were deep political, social and economical reasons for so slow development of modern post.
Firstly, the unchanged old post system seriously hindered the development of modern post. After modern post was created, post delivery system started to lose its value. It was inevitable for it to change to modern post. But the Qing government was not willing to abolish the post delivery. Although it was low efficient, in some extents, it could maintain official communication. Moreover, the funds of post delivery were 3,000,000 Liang silver which was the source of corruption for officials. Therefore, changing delivery into post certainly incurred the opposition from feudal bureaucratic group and caused internal conflicts.
Secondly, in 60s~70s of 19th century, Taiping Revolution which had persisted in its struggle for 18 years was suppressed, but the masses didn't stop their rebellion. Political and social crisis of the Qing Dynasty deepened. Changing delivery into Post and canceling public post office would cause large amount of post employees unemployed, which created the menace to the rulers, so the Qing government was hesitate to set up modern post. By 1890, the Prime office agreed to carry out post and asked for approval of the Emperor when it reached certain scale, under the promise of Had that establishing post office "wouldn't harm the benefit of civilians" and "couldn't cause difficulties for government post".
Thirdly, after "the Opium War", the imperialism widely plundered China. The Qing Government ceded territory and indemnified for several times and couldn't afford to set up and develop post. By then, only the China Customs managed by foreigners had abundant funds, while Hart-- the duty official of customs claimed that only the government permission, no person or money was needed for setting up post by customs. Hart didn't touch old post delivery system, which was one of the important reasons that post didn't exceed the range of customs for a long time.
As a new Productive force and scientific communication Organization, modern post should and could develop rapidly. On that time, many officials and civilians put forward the requirements and methods of establishing post by China itself. For example, reformers such as Wang Tao, Zhang Guangying, Chen Ciliang raised that establishing modern post could solve the problem of difficulties of civilian's communication, also it was beneficial to link up China with foreign countries. Their concrete method was to change post delivery into post, change post delivery officials into post staff, couriers were still responsible for delivery. In procedures, first, attaching post office to post delivery, then merging all facilities into post delivery to the post, integrating personnel in public post office into post office. Also Chen Ciliang opposed to hand the authorities on post to foreigners. From the historical point of view, the above proposals were basically feasible, and was Proved by the practice of Taiwan's post.