Dead
Media | 0.01-02.0 | 02.1-04.0
| 04.1-06.0 | 06.1-08.0 |
08.1-10.0 | 10.1-12.0 |
Subject: Dead Media Working Note 04.2
Dead medium: the pigeon post
Source: The Pigeon Post into Paris 1870-1871
by John Douglas Hayhurst
Published by the author at 65, Ford Bridge Road, Ashford
Middlesex
1970
Dewey: 383.144
H331p
University of Texas Library
Since discovering this privately printed work, I've
come to suspect that the strange story of the pigeon post
during the seige of Paris is the sine qua non of dead
media.
In the 1870s the pigeon post was a hobbyist's niche
medium. Under the intense conditions of warfare between
major industrial powers, this medium mutated and grew
explosively.
With the energy of a whole nation diverted into a
desperate need to communicate with the capital, there
emerged a sudden technical nexus of hot-air balloons,
magic lanterns, and photography (all of these were
experimental technologies, all of them pioneered by the
French). Unknown entrepreneurs suddenly became the
linchpin of a seamless national communications system,
combining pigeons, balloons, telegraphy, trains, messenger
boys, magic lanterns, typesetting, handwriting and
microphotography.
There was explosive, repeated growth in bandwidth,
until the message-space within one gram of weight suddenly
became too cheap to meter (though it was still metered).
Large-scale currency transfers took place through pigeons
(via microdot mail-orders). Encoded, compressed post-
cards were invented (the *depeches responses*).
Cryptography was used (by and for the government). There
was hacking by the system administrator (when Dagron the
microfilmist and war profiteer suddenly became the de
facto postmaster of Paris, he discovered that he had many
friends who didn't care to bother with normal allocation
of channels).
And last but not least, information warfare took
place, practiced by the besieging Prussians, who used
forged messages sent through captured pigeons.
It was all over in 6 months, a skyrocketing arc of
development followed by near-total media extinction,
commemorated with medals, folklore and bronze pigeon
statuary, but never to be repeated on such a scale again.
John Douglas Hayhurst, O.B.E., would appear to be (or
have been) primarily a postal historian and philatelist.
His slender 45-page history is a real treasure. (((My
comments are in triple parens.)))
page 2
"As had been expected, the normal channels of
communication into and out of Paris were interrupted
during the four and a half months of the siege, and,
indeed, it was not until the middle of February 1871 that
the Prussians relaxed their control of the postal and
telegraph services. With the encirclement of the city on
18th September, the last overhead telegraph wires were cut
on the morning of 19th September, and the secret telegraph
cable in the bed of the Seine was located and cut on 27th
September. Although a number of postmen suceeded in
passing through the Prussian lines in the earliest days of
the seige, others were captured and shot, and there is no
proof of any post, certainly after October, reaching Paris
from the outside, apart from private letters carried by
unofficial individuals.
"Five sheep dogs experienced in driving cattle into
Paris were flown out by balloon with the intention of
their returning carrying mail; after release they were
never again seen. (((So much for "Sheepdog Post," a
truly abortive medium.))) Equally a failure was the use
of zinc balls (the *boules de Moulins*) filled with
letters and floating down the Seine; not one of those
balls was recovered during the seige. (...) (((A pity for
enthusiasts of floating zinc-ball media.)))
page 3
"Millions of letters were carried outward from Paris
by balloon but free balloons could not offer a reliable
means of inward communication since they were at the mercy
of the wind and could not be directed to a predetermined
destination. The only balloon which made even a start of
a return flight to Paris was the *Jean Bart 1* which left
Rouen on 7th November but, after a first hop which took it
20 km towards Paris, the wind changed and further attempts
were abandoned. During January 1871, a fleet of free
balloons was being assembled at Lille but the armistice
prevented it from being put into operation. Self-
propelled dirigible balloons were then in their infancy
and whilst, on 9th January, the *Duquesne,* fitted with
two propellers, left Paris bound for Besancon and
Switzerland, it got only as far as Reims. For an assured
communication into Paris, the only successful method was
by the time-honored carrier pigeon, and thousands of
messages, official and private, were thus taken into the
besieged city. (...)"
page 8
"Savelon has deduced the monthly statistics as:
September & October 1870 : 105 released, 22 arrived
November 1870: 83 released, 19 arrived
December 1870: 49 released, 12 arrived
January 1871: 43 released, 3 arrived
February 1871: 22 released, 3 arrived
"The weather was not the only hazard facing the pigeons:
there were their natural enemies the hawks and there were
countrymen with their shotguns seeking food for their
families. (...) The best pigeons would have been the
first to be used and as time passed the birds would have
been less trained and so less likely to return safely to
Paris. It was therefore no mean achievement that, on 59
occasions, they did succeed in getting back to their
lofts. Their achievement was commemorated in the monument
by Bartholdi and Rubin at the Porte des Ternes in Paris
which was unveiled on 28th January 1906 and melted down by
the Germans in 1944; around the central representation of
a balloon were four pedestals each bearing a pair of
bronze pigeons. (...)"
Dead
Media | 0.01-02.0 | 02.1-04.0
| 04.1-06.0 | 06.1-08.0 |
08.1-10.0 | 10.1-12.0 |