Let's say I want to send a letter from Britain to someone in one of the British North American colonies around 1750.
Do I simply put a stamp on a letter, put it in a postbox and let Royal Mail pick it up by horse-and-cart to take to their depot? Who delivered post back then?
Once the postal delivery service had the letter, how would they sort it for delivery to North America? Would they hold on to it until they had enough letters to warrant paying for a ship to take them all? Or were merchant ships in the business of delivering mail as a side job? How long would it take before my letter even left Britain? And how long would its journey at sea take?
Once it arrived in North America, was there a centralised service that collected and delivered post in the mid C18th or would it be delivered to some sort of depot and the recipient would have to check every week or so to see if anything had arrived for them?
Would sending letters from Britain to North America be affordable for people at this time? Was it the case that letters often never arrived or arrived so late as to make their news severely outdated?
I've got a lot of questions arising from the one I've used as a title.
Thank you in advance for anyone who may have a contribution.
Edit: In case context is important, lets say I am a small business owner. I don't have any political or military connections, or any direct trade with the new world. But I'm doing reasonably well financially and have a relative in North America that I want to keep in contact with.
I can answer some of these questions, though not all of them.
By the 18th century, Britain had a decent mail system with stamps, post-boys (although they were notoriously inefficient), and stagecoaches. There were post offices in more densely populated areas, and others that served large rural areas. Often these ones were in a general store or tavern, and people would go there to pick up their mail; or someone who was in town would pick up mail for all their rural neighbours. There were cross-roads that served as mail transfer points to help cover more ground.
Generally, merchant ships would carry mail to British North America. It took a long time and was expensive. The best way was to send the mail with someone you knew personally who was going overseas. Many letters never made it to their destination because of shipwrecks, pirates, and general confusion and poor transport both in Britain and BNA. It was also difficult to find recipients because urban growth was so rapid in BNA, and towns popped up all over the places, roads became more developed and street names changed, and people moved from their initial landing point to settle somewhere more permanently.
In BNA, there was a postal service but it was difficult to regulate because of how geographically large the area was. The service also made no money. But they would transport letters up and down the coast, and basically leave them in an inn or tavern near the final address. Then the innkeepers would kind of spread the word: "Hey, tell Bill there's a letter for him." Or else people would check for mail the next time they were near the inn.
It was totally possible for someone to leave their family in Britain and literally never hear from them again, especially if they left a rural area and settled in a rural area in BNA.