Stamp & Coin Mart - April 2016_

http://www.stampandcoin.co.uk APRIL 2016^33

Your monthly guide to specialist stamps, stamp-related material and postal ephemera

country from August 1840. Subsequently

a much more stable and reliable black ink

was developed by Perkins & Co. It could

not could be removed without seriously

damaging the postage stamp. Early

obliterators were hand-carved in wood.

From the very moment they went into

use each was unique in the minute details

of the cancellation it left on the cover and

stamp. Wear, breakage and replacement

resulted in even more variations, all

of them of great interest to advanced

collectors; but a beginner who can add

a red and a black Maltese Cross (on or

off cover) to his/her budding collection

will, I’m sure, be delighted to own them

regardless of the minutiae of their history.

The introduction of the Penny Red in

February 1841 improved the visibility

of the black Maltese Cross killers; but

another weakness in the cancellation

regime became apparent as a result

of a number of prosecutions of Post

Office staff (postmasters as well as

rank-and-file stampers) failing when,

for example, the prosecution in a case

could not prove that a particular office

had applied a cancellation because

all Maltese Crosses were more or less

identical. Not long afterwards numerals

(from 1 to 12) were inserted in the

Maltese Crosses used in the London

Chief Office so that each stamper could,

if necessary, be traced.

Numerals

Handsome though the Maltese Cross

appeared when correctly applied, it was

regarded as too small and too light in its

central area to effectively and securely

cancel an adhesive stamp. Improvements

in 1844 introduced a new type of

canceller, the Numeral Obliterator.

Every major sorting office was allotted

its own number, which appeared within

a pattern of bars on its new cancellers.

In England and Wales these patterns

were of oval shape; Scotland received

rectangular shapes; while Ireland used

diamond types. In the London area a

distinctive series with numerals 1 to

12 enclosed within the English oval

replaced the numeral Maltese Crosses.

Obliterators did not, of course,

indicate when and where a piece of

mail had been posted. That information

was in those days usually recorded

on the back of the cover with either

a circular or rectangular mark. The

time-consuming task of marking,

turning, and marking again on every

letter led to the introduction of a

combination double stamp or Duplex

struck on the front of the cover. Initial

trials in the 1850s produced some

unusual shapes, including ‘spoon’

cancellations, popularly named for their

shape, in England; and ‘Madelaine

Smith’ cancellations in Glasgow. That

sobriquet was applied in reference to a

contemporary Glasgow murder trial in

which the prosecution case fell apart as a

result of police investigators accidentally

replacing certain letters in the wrong

envelopes which carried duplex

cancellations that provided a plausible

alibi for the female accused who was

acquitted with a ‘not proven’ verdict.

Another trial, much simpler but

certainly as eye-catching, involved

the use of a dotted circumference to

the circle featured in many duplex

designs. An explanation from members

of the public who noticed the dotted

circle at the time was that such marks

only appeared on mail collected from

newfangled pillar-boxes. As in the

Glasgow murder trial, the verdict was

‘not proven’.

After several years of experimentation

throughout Britain the duplex mark

widely adopted consisted of a stamp

cancelling portion with an adjoining

section that showed clearly the town,

date and collection time details, all

struck with a single blow to the front of

the envelope. The back was now used

by the receiving town to record arrival.

A few complaints from addressees about

damaged contents; and from stampers

about the increased weight of the new

tool they had to strike down at a rate

of over 100 cancels per minute; did not

deflect London HQ from encouraging

the introduction of the duplex mark

throughout Britain.

Postmarks history becomes

considerably more complex if pursued

further. Why not try finding examples of

those introduced briefly here and learning

more about them from the sources

suggested? If your interest is sustained you

might go on to buy or bid on an example

or two at the bargain basement end of

this rich branch of philately.

Thanks to Grosvenor Philatelic Auctions

for use of images accompanying this feature.

Enjoy more at grosvenorauctions.com

Thanks also to Russell Taylor, whose website

GB VICTORIAN POSTMARKS POST

1840 is recommended.

From left: numeral 7 in a

black Maltese Cross on

a 1d red used on a cover

mailed 1843;

English numerical

cancellations 873 on 1d

reds from Weymouth to

Dorchester in 1851

Liverpool spoon

cancellation on

registered envelope

from Liverpool to

London in 1857

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