Come Home At Once

For the past ten years, Guy Atkins has been hooked on collecting Edwardian postcard messages. In this book of 100 intriguing cards, he shares the highlights of a unique collection.   At half the price of sending a letter, and with same-day delivery in urban areas, between 1902 and 1914 Britain became obsessed with the postcard: by the outbreak of the First World War the Post Office was delivering close to a billion cards a year. Guy’s postcards all come from this Golden Age and offer tantalizing insights into a century-old conversations.   While some messages shock (“I thought you would like a postcard of where I am being cured of my stammer-ing” written on the back of a card featuring a rather dour country house) others are just downright bizarre – such as the card where the sender has simply written “Salmon!!!!!!!” From messages written in (often naively simple) code to pleas for spare trousers to be sent, each card presents a mystery and forces us to rethink the humble postcard, its origins, and the people who sent them.