What was a thank-you letter? By Susannah Jowitt
The earliest surviving letter from Winston Churchill was a handwritten note to his mother. In 1882, aged seven, he wrote to thank her for his gifts of ‘soldiers, flag and castle’. The painstaking italic penmanship of the very young Churchill later gave way to the easy, flowing script of a man who dashed off handwritten thank-you letters most days of the week, as can be seen among the million items in the Churchill Papers. Handwritten thank-you letters have made their mark in every civilisation. Persian Queen Atossa wrote the earliest surviving one in about 500 BC. Before a national postage system and the launch of the Penny Black first stamp in 1840, the cost of receiving any letter had to be borne by the recipient, rather dimming the thoughtfulness of any thanks-giver. By the 1860s, the penny postal system was booming. With up to 12 collections each day in Victorian...
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