After Christmas in Blackburn, post office workers found themselves with a mountain of letters and parcels on January 2 1980.

Over the festive period, cards and gifts were sent to loved ones from Blackburn. But, wrong or absent addresses often made it difficult to trace the destination, leaving Post Executive Ron Smith with a headache.

The workers would sift through the mail and try to find a return address, but with so many to look at, this proved to be a task too hard to complete.

Blackburn's Assistant head postmaster, Mr Jack Sanderson appealed to the public to label their mall correctly. He said: "Many people lose addresses and wrongly memorise them. We also get a lot of mail sent to old addresses. We even get some with no address at all.

"I cannot over emphasise how important it is for senders to take care in getting addresses and spellings correct.

"This problem exists all year round. But it trebles around the Christmas period."

Presents for children were being donated to charities and the cancer fund, but the post officer workers would attempt to find the rightful owners before doing this.

Mr Sanderson added: "We do not like to have to get rid of them this way." But, no address meant it would not reach the children on time, if at all.