Extraordinary coincidences have been chronicled in connection with almost every situation in life, some fortunate and attended with profit to those involved, others unfortunate or disastrous; and the Post-office is no exception to the rule as being a field for the observation of such occurrences. The peculiar nature of the coincidences to be observed in the following examples may be worthy of note, or at any rate the cases may repay their perusal with some small degree of interest:—

"Among the workmen employed in some alterations at a nobleman's country seat were two bearing exactly the same Christian name and surname, but unconnected and unacquainted with each other, one being a joiner, the other a mason. The joiner, who was a depositor in the Post-office Savings' Bank, having received no acknowledgment of a deposit of £3, obtained a duplicate. The mason, who was not a depositor, became insane and was removed to a lunatic asylum about the same time; and the original acknowledgment, intended for the joiner, having fallen into the hands of the mason's mother, she concluded that the account was his, and made a claim for the money towards defraying the expenses of his maintenance, and was with difficulty undeceived."

A registered packet containing a valuable gold seal was sent to a firm of fancy stationers in Newcastle-on-Tyne, and delivered at its address in due course. Complaint was shortly afterwards made, however, that the young person who opened the packet found the seal was not enclosed, and inquiries were at once set on foot in the Post-office to discover how and where it could have been abstracted. A week or two after, and while these inquiries were still proceeding, the firm in question reported that a tradesman in town had presented to them the identical seal, with the view of ascertaining its value! This information served as a clue to the elucidation of the matter, and the loss of the seal was shown to have occurred in the following fashion:—In the process of opening the packet, the young person concerned had carelessly allowed the seal to fall, unobserved by her; it got mixed up with waste-paper, which formed part of some waste shortly thereafter removed to the premises of a marine-store dealer, where it underwent a course of sortation. An old woman engaged in this work found the seal, appropriated it, and without more ado pawned it. The person with whom it was pledged was he who presented it at the address where it had dropped from the letter. The coincidence is not only a curious one, but the case illustrates how, but for the coincidence, the blame of the loss would have rested on the Post-office.

A traveller in the north of Europe became sadly puzzled with letters which followed him about, although not intended for him, and the difficulties in his case are described in a letter written by him, of which the following is a transcript:—

"I am sorry you have had so much trouble respecting the registered letter supposed to have been lost in transmission from my wife to me in ——. But I assure you the letter was most carefully and punctually delivered, not having been even a post behind its due time, and I think your case can hardly have referred to me at all. There was another Rev. J—— D—— (the same name) travelling in Norway at the same time, whose letters kept crossing my path everywhere; and when I read them, I was almost in doubt whether I was myself or him, for his wife had the same name as mine, and his baby the same name as mine, and just the same age; but who he can be I cannot make out, only he is not I. Perhaps the registered letter which has given you such trouble may have been for him. It may satisfy you, however, to know that mine was all right."

The following incident occurred about twenty years ago. A gentleman of the uncommon name of Onions was travelling in Scotland, and was expected by his friends to call at a certain Post-office for letters on a particular day. The day prior to this, a telegram reached this Post-office from his home in the south of England, requesting that he might be told to return at once, owing to the serious illness of his brother. The telegram upon its receipt was duly placed in the proper box by the clerk in charge of the poste restante at the time, and who of course, the telegram being open, was aware of its contents. Next day, when the same clerk was upon duty, a Mr Onions presented himself, asking for letters; but the clerk, on going to the box to get the aforesaid telegram, was unable to find it, nor could any one in the office at the time say anything about it. Mr Onions was, however, informed of its import, whereupon he said he had no brother, but as his father had been ailing when he left, he supposed a mistake of "brother" for "father" had been made in transmission, and that the message was no doubt intended for him. He then left the office. A few days later the postmaster received a letter from this gentleman, then in the south of England, stating that he had been made the victim of a cruel hoax (he having found on reaching home that no telegram had been sent to him), and he was the more convinced of this because his visit to Scotland was in pursuance of his honeymoon.

The matter being investigated, it transpired that on the morning of the day on which Mr Onions called for letters, another Mr Onions, for whom the message was meant, had called and received the telegram from a clerk who shortly thereafter went off duty. The confusion had thus arisen through two persons of the same uncommon name calling at the same Post-office on the same day for letters, and, as it happened, applying for their letters at hours when two different clerks were in attendance.

In the following case the names are fictitious, but in their similarity they will adequately illustrate the narrative:—

The sudden expansion of telegraph business upon the transfer of the telegraphs to the State in 1870, necessitated the employment of a large number of inexperienced operators, and some awkward blunders were the consequence. In the year mentioned, a Liverpool man named Parlane went to London; but before parting with his wife, it was arranged that on a certain day he would telegraph whether she should join him in London or he would return to Liverpool. On the appointed day the promised telegram was sent asking his wife to come to London, the message being directed (we shall say) to Mrs Parlane, 24 Menzies Street, Toxteth Park, Liverpool. By some accidental failure of current, or imperfect signalling the word "Menzies"6 reached Liverpool as "Meins,"6 and there being no Meins Street in Liverpool, the messenger was directed to take the message for trial to Main Street, for which it was thought it might be intended. The messenger found at 24 Main Street6 a Mrs M'Farlane, and to this person the message was presented. The names being similar, Mrs M'Farlane opened the telegram, and her husband also being in London, she had no doubt whatever that the command which it contained to repair to London, though altogether unexpected, was intended for herself. That evening she accordingly started for the metropolis.

Meanwhile Mrs Parlane had been suffering intense anxiety at not receiving the promised telegram, and being unable longer to endure the suspense in which she found herself, she likewise started for London the same evening. Strange as it may appear, both Mrs Parlane and Mrs M'Farlane travelled to London not only by the same train, but in the same compartment; and it was by a comparison of notes that the telegram intended for the one was discovered to have got into the hands of the other. The string of coincidences in this matter is exceedingly singular—viz., that two persons of similar names should reside at the same number in neighbouring streets; that the husbands of both should be in London at the same time; that the two wives should travel to London in the same train; and that they should find themselves companions in the same compartment.

Identity in names and addresses in all particulars sometimes gives rise to trouble and inconvenience. Through the misdelivery of a savings-bank acknowledgment, it was brought to light that in a suburban district of London, where there were two terraces bearing exactly the same designation, there were residing, at the same number in each, two persons having, not only the same surname, but the same Christian name.

But even more curious are the following facts in the matter of similar names and addresses, though in this instance nothing of ill-consequence has yet arisen beyond the occasional misdelivery of a letter. In Edinburgh at the present time (1885), there resides at 5 St Andrew's Terrace a Mr James Gibson, and, immediately opposite, at 5 St Andrew's Place, another Mr James Gibson. It happens, also, that a Mr John Gibson is to be found at 5 St Andrew Square. Hence we have this very singular series of almost identical addresses, the persons concerned being all different, and, so far as we are aware, unacquainted with each other:—

(1) Mr J. Gibson,
5 St Andrew's Terrace.
(2) Mr J. Gibson,
5 St Andrew's Place.
(3) Mr J. Gibson,
5 St Andrew Square.

In consequence of the misdelivery of a post-packet, the following case of almost identical addresses in two different towns was brought under notice:—

Mr Andrew Thom,
Boot Maker,
8 South Bridge Street,
Airdrie.

And
Mr Andrew Thom,
Boot Top Manufacturer,
86 South Bridge,
Edinburgh.

Not very long ago, two letters directed to Mrs R—— at her residence in Edinburgh were duly delivered there; but as the lady was at the time living at the Grand Hotel in London, they were placed under a fresh cover by one of her family and forwarded thither. Some days thereafter the Postmaster of Glasgow received a communication from a Mrs R—— (the same name), residing at the Grand Hotel, expressing great astonishment that the two letters, which she now returned, had been sent to her, since her permanent address was not in Edinburgh, but Glasgow. The matter was afterwards explained, on the fact becoming known that two ladies of the same name, one hailing from Glasgow, the other from Edinburgh, had been living at the same time in the same hotel, and that the waiter had delivered the letters to the wrong person.