A bank in Wales says it received a postcard from 121 years ago

Henry Darby has a piece of local history tucked away in his top desk drawer at work.

Darby is the communications manager for the Swansea Building Society, a member-owned financial institution in Swansea, Wales, that received what appears to be a 121-year-old postcard in the mail.

“It looks like something that should be in a museum, definitely. The penmanship is amazing,” Darby told As It Happens guest host Susan Bonner.

“It reads, you know, very much like it’s from a different time — which it is.”

Right place, wrong time

The postcard arrived at the building society’s office on Friday and stood out from the rest of the usual, everyday business correspondence. 

On the front is a black-and-white illustration of a stag near a lake, a reproduction of The Challenge by British painter Edwin Henry Landseer.

It’s addressed, in cursive handwriting, to “Miss Lydia Davies” and affixed with a stamp of King Edward VII, the British monarch who ruled from 1901 to 1910. An ink-stamp from the postal service dates the postcard to Aug. 23, ’03. 

Because of the stamp, Darby says he believes ’03 is, in fact, 1903 — something he called “quite surreal.”

“The plan is to try and get it to, hopefully, one of Lydia’s living relatives, wherever they may now live,” he said.

The postcard, he says, seems to have ended up at the right place, but at the wrong time. 

It’s addressed to 11 Cradock Street, which is, indeed, the Swansea Building Society’s address. But 121 years ago, Darby says, there were houses where the building now stands.

“The houses were bombed in World War II, and that’s where our office was then built,” he said. “It just happened to be that the address was retained.”

A spokesperson for the Royal Mail, the U.K.’s postal service, said in an email: “It is likely that this postcard was put back into our system rather than being lost in the post for over a century. When an item is in our system, we are under obligation to deliver it to the correct address.”

Tracy Coleman of the Royal Philatelic Society London — an organization for stamp collectors and postal historians — said the postcard and stamp appear normal for the time, though she cautioned she couldn’t provide a definitive answer. 

“It looks to be a standard stamp with markings of that period and there doesn’t seem to be anything unusual about it. It is the sort of postcard that anyone can find many examples of at a stamp fair or even in charity shops,” Coleman told CBC in an email. 

Darby theorizes someone may have come across the postcard at an estate sale and decided to pop it in the mail. Whether it ever reached its intended recipient in 1903, he says, is unclear. 

What does it say?

The back of the postcard reads: “Remember me to Miss Gilbert + John with love to all from Ewart.” 

It also says, in part: “Dear L. I could not, it was impossible to get the pair of these. I am so sorry, but I hope you are enjoying yourself at home.”

Darby says it’s clear Ewart and Lydia were “talking about something quite specific, although they don’t actually allude to what they’re talking about.”

His theory? “We’re guessing it’s a pair of shoes.”

Darby shared the postcard on the building society’s Facebook page in the hopes of tracking down the recipient’s relatives. He’s also been working with the West Glamorgan Archives to try and piece together her story. 

“From there, we’ve had an amazing kind of flurry of information,” he said. “Lots of people have been in contact and kind of helped us put together the pieces of what life looked like for Lydia, and what life in Swansea was like 121 years ago.”

Darby believes the letter was intended for a then-16-year-old Lydia Davies, who lived in Swansea at the time with her father, who was a master tailor, her mother and five younger siblings, until she got married and moved to England. 

“It seems like that’s kind of when Lydia’s story stops and we’re not really sure when she died or if she had children,” he said.

Through social media, he says he’s been able to connect with Lydia’s great-niece. But, he admits, he can’t be sure he has identified the correct Lydia Davies.

“Obviously, it’s hard to fact check,” he said. “The name Lydia Davies is a very common name in Wales”

Until he can confirm the details, he says he’s keeping the letter in his desk for safe keeping. He’s hoping that the news coverage will generate more leads.

“I think a lot of people are intrigued to kind of see where this goes,” he said.