The Sikkim Rocket Mail Service: First Airborne Mail Service on Earth to Use Rockets for Delivery!
You must have heard of snail mail, e-mail and even drone mail, but have you heard of rocket mail? Where airborne rockets were used to deliver a letter or parcel to its destination address?
If not, then read on because a small Kingdom in the Eastern Himalayas, Sikkim, had just that, a rocket mail service, in 1935!
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Realizing a dream
On the 7th of April, 1935, a unique experiment in mail delivery was conducted at Gangtok, the capital of the small former Kingdom of Sikkim in the remote eastern Himalayas, now a part of India. It was the culmination of the dreams and hard work of an eccentric man, Stephen Hector Taylor-Smith, a pioneering Indian aerospace engineer who spent a good part of his life developing a mail system using rockets.
It was also the first time on earth that mail was airborne and also had official sanction of the state. Because before that, though Smith had been encouraged by the Indian officials, he had never been given official sanction and recognition by any government, anywhere.
A year earlier, in the year 1934, he had tried to send some mail from a ship to the shore of Calcutta, but that had failed when the rocket exploded in mid air and fell into the sea, and only a few of the mail could be salvaged. His failure must have been anticipated by the officials then because prior to becoming a aerospace engineer, he had been a customs official, then a policeman and latter, a dentist!
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Success in the flights
But in Sikkim he was welcomed by the King who was enthusiastic to the idea, the whole program being endorsed with the release of four different "Rocket Mail Stamps" to be used on letters and parcels sent by this new service. In fact 2000 of each of these stamps were printed and has now become a collectible for aerophilately enthusiasts.
Between 1934 and 1935, Smith made more than 270 launches out of which around 80 were rocket mail launches, meaning they were carrying either rocket mail covers or a parcel. The launches were made using rockets made locally in Calcutta by the Oriental Fireworks Company, and who were supplying the rockets free of cost to Smith.
As per the records available now, they had supplied sixteen rockets in total between 23 March 1935 and 29 June 1935. Later also known as the "Silver Jubilee" flights, they had carried over a thousand rocket-gram covers between them.
Pioneering launches
Smith also created history when he successfully launched the first food package to the earthquake wracked region of Quetta (now in Pakistan) across a river later on. A package which contained rice, grain, spices, biris (Indian cigarettes) and 150 rocket-grams for the ravaged people there.
Another first was recorded when he transported livestock for the first time ever. His cargo consisted of a cock and hen together with 189 rocket-grams, which was launched across the river Damodar, in India. Fortunately, both the birds survived and are known to have been donated to a private zoo in Calcutta after their ordeal.
But his quirky nature came through when his next parcel consisted of an apple, 106 covers of rocket mail and a snake he called miss Creepy! Again, thankfully, the snake too survived the flight, though there are no records to show what was done with it after that.
Contribution to the War effort
During the second world war, Smith tried to use his new technology for the benefit of the "Country and Queen" and did conduct a few launches. But they were more like demonstrations and experiments, even though they did carry a few mails and covers. But the later rockets were gas fired and the last recorded flight was on the 4th of December, 1944, after which we hear no more about this maverick and his creation.
Stephen Hector Taylor-Smith, a proud Anglo Indian, died on 15 February 1951, but he had already been immortalized as the father of a new type of mail, rocket mail. And after Independence, the government of India through its department of posts, issued a stamp in honor of this pioneer of the first airborne mail service in the world.
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