Mail Service

Early on, any mail for Colonel By and his officers was delivered in Hull, Lower Canada, and ferried across the Ottawa river [Legget 1972]. In the days of Bytown, envelopes were not used, the letter usually being written on one side of the page only, and then folded into the shape of an envelope. It was then sealed with a gob of wax, and addressed [Guillet 1966]. In 1846, the mail was conveyed from Bytown to Kingston on horseback [Smith 1846]. On 4 November 1848, the Phoenix was built and launched in Wrightstown, and under Captain Andrew Patterson it replaced the Speed as the royal mail steamer, making daily daylight trips, except on Sundays, between Bytown and Grenville [Lamirande 1982].