Since 1798, the Old Down Inn at Emborough has seen post being delivered and collected, in one form or another.

In that year, the coaching inn was declared an official Receiving House (the equivalent of today’s sub-post office) and was later upgraded to its own postmark, giving it the status of a head post office. The postmark was in use until around 1840.

The London-Bath-Exeter mail coach service started running past Old Down in 1785, according to a copy of the Postmaster General’s minutes which hang on a wall of the inn. Mail coaches stopped to change horses, mail bags were delivered and collected and deliveries were organised to a number of neighbouring towns and villages.

But it seems thieves may have brought that period of postal history to an end – the cast iron letter box which stood in the wall of the inn disappeared one night

recently and villagers are seeing red over concerns it might not be replaced.

It was an Elizabeth II box, but still valuable; older – rarer – boxes dating from

Victorian times can be worth a small fortune to collectors.

The disappearance of the box was discovered by Maxine McCluskey, owner of the Old Down, when she went to post some letters. Maxine said: “We didn’t hear a thing. I had such a shock when I saw it had gone. We think it must have been taken overnight on Saturday, 3rd June.

“The Old Down Inn has a unique link with the history of our postal service, and I really hope that the post box is replaced soon.”

Maxine is due to give a talk about the history of the Old Down Inn to members of the Radstock History Society on Tuesday, 4th July.