Simon Evans - the postman poet
scenes from a rural postal round
Simon Evans was born in 1895 in Wales, but his family moved to Merseyside when the family farm became too difficult to run with a growing number of sons. After leaving school at the age of 14, Simon took work with the post office, then known as the GPO (General Post Office). When war broke out, he enlisted with the 16th Cheshires and saw active service in the trenches where he was wounded and then later gassed in 1918. These experiences, as for many of his generation, left him both mentally and physically scarred.
Returning from the war, he found it difficult to settle back into urban life, and the gas damage to his lungs meant he had to have occasional treatment and respite. Following a six month stay at a convalescent home, he was advised to take a walking holiday. This took him to Cleobury Mortimer, a small market town in the south Shropshire countryside. He discovered a local postman who was keen to exchange his rural postal round for an urban one, and Simon managed to facilitate the exchange. He immediately fell in love with the area, the scenery, its wildlife, and the inhabitants that he met whilst walking his daily 16 mile route through the Rea valley, which he did each day and through every season.
Despite having left school at 14, he had a natural affinity and talent for writing, and he started to recount the rural way of life he experienced and the characters he encountered on his round. His short contributions to magazines and newspapers brought him to the attention of the BBC, and he became a contributor to live programmes on the Midland Service. Soon after, a publisher picked up his work, and ‘Round About the Crooked Steeple’ was published, a collection of his articles about his rural postal route. Subsequent publications followed and he became well known.
Unfortunately, he never fully recovered from his war injuries and his gas damaged lungs, and he died the day before his 45th birthday, on 9th August 1940.
This series of photos follows his postal route, featuring places he mentioned in his writings. The views have probably changed little since the days when Simon Evans walked it each day, delivering the post to the remote rural communities in this corner of the south Shropshire countryside.
