The Queen and the exploding post box

Had Monday off so went for a cycle. On my way back I detoured to Inch to visit this postbox. It may look normal but there is history to be told:

In 1952, as the Queen’s coronation approached, the Post Office started erecting a new style of pillar box throughout the UK marked with Her Majesty’s royal cypher: E II R, standing for Elizabeth II Regina.

The post box at the junction of Gilmerton Road and Walter Scott Avenue was to be Scotland’s first ‘E II R’ pillar box and was unveiled 28 November 1952. The problem was that the Tudor Queen Elizabeth I had never ruled over Scotland, therefore the suggestion that there could be a Queen Elizabeth II was considered grossly inaccurate and unacceptable to many Scots. 

After multiple failed attempts to damage the post box, on 12 February 1953 at around 10pm, the area was rocked by an explosion that could be heard a mile away. The three-month-old post box had been completely blown apart courtesy of a gelignite bomb. Soon after, a brand new pillar box replaced it with no sign of E II R.

Above copied from Scotsman article which itself was an excerpt from Edinburgh in the 1950s: Ten years that changed a city