See RED TEXT ABOVE for world wide BANK TRANSFERS by WISE, PayPal also available. Contact on WhatsApp on 0066 0823715197
| Country: St. Vincent Clear Subject: All | Sort: Newest listed first |
;)
(3 May 2020) These colourful illustrated items are infrequently met and add both character and appeal to album pages. The 1904 cover used from Barbados shows the Toronto Lith Company factory, and the 1972 cover from Mustique came by way of holiday maker previously at the Hotel Abacoa, St. Andres, Isla, Colombia.
;)
;)
(29 April 2020) I have not been keeping tabs on the Parcel Post cancels after the QV-KE7 period but Ray Stanton and Roy Bond have kindly furnished me with scans of the strikes listed in the Ted Proud St. Vincent handbook and the recent PML update by Charles Freeland, Roy Bond, Russell Boylan covering the period 1899-1965. Roy confirms that the illustrated KGV 6d, 1/- on piece dated 25 JU 26 has an unrecorded “B” code and will be incorporated in his update within the BWISC Journal in due course.
;)
;)
(28 April 2020) During the Napoleonic wars correspondence was almost exclusively sent unpaid in duplicate or triplicate by different vessels in the hope that one entire would reach its destination. The contents of each incoming or outgoing letter were entered into Copy Books keeping a complete record of transmissions should loss occur. After the war mail continued to be sent mostly unpaid but with confidence growing in the safety of the seas and some writers using courtesy prepayment the Crowned Circle PAID AT handstamp was introduced having been proofed at the GPO, London on JA 30 1852. Prepayment to foreign ports was already established. Over the period JU 4 1852 to JU 6 1866 some 59 covers are currently recorded with the PAID AT ST. VINCENT mark showing varying uses. The strikes are always in red ink with the exception of the unique black strike on cover to Paris dated AU 10 1858. Examples on Perkins Bacon “loose” stamp are rarely found and their use, as such, has no ready explanation. The illustrated example on 1877 QV 6d pale green P.11½ to 12½ x 15 sideways star wmk (SG.23 , invoiced DE 30 1876, Ex Becker collection) shows that the instrument survived the Fire at the Kingstown Post Office on October 29 1866.
;)
The PML handbook Page 97 notes that the population of this small island, 9 miles south of Kingstown and first port of call in the Grenadine chain of islands stretching south down to Grenada, was a mere 969 persons in 1871 and 1,118 in 1881, and states “The reason for the long delay in opening the Bequia office has not been explained but on its eventual opening on 9th July 1894 the old “BEQ” datestamp was available for use there". The neighbouring islands of CANOUAN (population 443 in 1891), MAYREAU (population 283 in 1891), and UNION ISLAND (population 889 in 1891) had their extended cds proofed at the GPO, London on 2nd November 1894 and therefore those instruments could not have been present when the offices opened on 1st October 1894. The PERUVIAN VALE cds was also proofed at the GPO, London on 2nd November 1894 nearly seven years after the Peruvian Vale had been opened, and the long gap plugged by provional use of an obsolete ST. VINCENT inscribed datestamp. There appears to have been no request for an extended BEQUIA cds for the mid 1894 opening, and it is just possible that the postmasters were in a quandery, like at the other Grenadine island offices, as to what to do, or use, during the opening days or weeks until an instrument was at hand. Perhaps Bequia left mail uncancelled for the first 10 days as the ERD for cancelled mail is JY 19 94 with the old “BEQ” datestamp, or was the Kingstown Postmaster well aware that sitting in his drawer for the past 22 odd years was the “BEQ” datestamp that had been presumably been proofed alongside the other abbreviates for the opening of mainland village offices on 2nd December 1872. It is possible that any one of these four islands saw a provisional use of the obsolete circled “PP” in black on DLR QV 1d red (SG.48 grouping) as only a single strike is known befitting a very short period of use.
;)
The “Circle of Dots”, as described in the PML handbook Page 129, is only known struck in black ink and only found on the 1880 QV 1d olive-green (SG.29, 60,000 stamps invoiced May 13 1880). Of the 12 copies known to me the key stamp to assist in establishing where this mark was applied is the Ex Messenger copy overstruck black “CA” (at Calliaqua) dated JY 30 81. Only 4 offices were using the black ink pad at this time being Barrouallie, Calliaqua, Kingstown, and Mesopotamia. A chart has been prepared to show the nearest known strikes either side of the JY 30 81 date as gleaned from either “loose” dated stamps or covers. Barrouallie had use of both vertical “A10” and “BAR” datestamp, the Calliaqua “CA” datestamp is so commonly applied on SG.29 that a single dated strike effectively rules out its use at that office, Kingstown had use of horizontal “A10”, GB/40c, “K” datestamp, ST. VINCENT cds, which leaves by elimination Mesopotamia as the most likely candidate. The chart shows no dated strikes for Mesopotamia period JA 12 81 to SP 7 82 (21 months) and Peter Jaffe in a Stamp Collecting magazine 18 November 1950 article (no copy of same retained) reported that there was no Postmaster at Mesopotomia at DE 23 80. Only four strikes of black “MES” are recorded after that date on SG.29 being xx JA 81, 9 JA 81, JA 10 81, JA 12 81 and then comes the “unknown period” until SP 7 82. Mail from the village of Mesopotamia would have continued and initial copies may have been “killed” in manuscript before it was thought to apply the wafer seal impressions. The 9th illustration shows perhaps an early combination. Activity at the other black ink offices is shown for the Mesopotamia unknown period JA 12 81 to SP 7 82.
;)
;)
;)
;)
As a consequence of the OC 24 1810 Mutiny at Falmouth, Cornwall (see Britnor P.93, Robertson E.86) the Falmouth packets were transferred to the Hamoaze at Plymouth, Devon on NO 6 1810 where a temporary office was set up by Post Office Agent Saverland and staff at the Fountain Inn until the packets at Plymouth were transferred back FE 4 1811 arriving Falmouth FE 15 1811 - The illustrated NO 12 1810 copied letter was sent from PLYMOUTH by "Express" Jamaica packet on NO 23 but owing to 'bad weather' the sailing was interrupted and the packet put back to FALMOUTH on NO 20 and finally sailed NO 27 arriving Barbados DE 28, the NO 28 1820 copied letter was sent by "Francis Freeling" Leeward Islands packet from PLYMOUTH DE 1 to 3 (sailing dates vary) arriving Barbados DE 28, the FE 13 1811 original was sent on FE 16 by the "Duke of Kent" Leeward Islands packet from FALMOUTH (being the FIRST SAILING of the resumed service packet to the West Indies), written Horse Guards and Golden Square, London to Major General L.S. Order, Commanding, St. Vincents rated 2/- unpaid. Military content respecting the discharge of Private Thomas Booth of the 1st Battalion 90th Regiment.
;)
;)
;)
;)
;)
Although I have massively long text files of cancels I have handled, or seen, I do not have any postmark collections of my own. Written details of St. Vincent abbreviated and extended cds, with their incorporated dates and differing coloured inks in places are easy to understand, but even with years of experience I often stumble when it comes to the commonest obliterators on common stamps in my trying to remember just how common, or how scarce, they actually are. As a consequence I have recently undertaken trying to get an illustration of every different St. Vincent possibility on every different issue up to the end of KGV. The attached page for the PB QV 1d drab shows how far I have currently reached, and the item which is probably less common than all the others is the strike of the black vertical "A10" - which I would have overlooked thinking it much commoner!!
;)
Illustrated are all the combinations currently known to me on these DLR Perf. 12 QV 4d blues Crown CA wmk. The latest discovery is the vertical red "A10" applied Georgetown, not the best of strikes but currently unique.
;)
St. Vincent stands apart from its immediate neighbours being Grenada, St. Lucia, and Barbados in that when havoc took its toll during the Queen Victoria and early King Edward VII reigns some post offices could only function with temporary manuscripts or use of obsolete instruments, whilst her neighbouring island post offices seem unscathed. This short article shows the activity of the then functioning St. Vincent and Grenadine islands post offices post the May 7 1902 eruption of the Soufriere volcano in the north of the island which killed over 2,000 people. When there are unaccounted activity periods (unknown periods) one can speculate as to what instrument, if any, was being used in the absence of further earlier dated examples, and in the case of Georgetown (8 weeks unknown period) one could fully understand if a re-introduced "G" abbreviate turned up!!
;)
Preparation of 175,000 First Day Covers - each cancellation had to be near perfect and covers were piled up in the centre of the table as they could not be boxed until cancelling ink dry, and more importantly that there was absolutely no chance that moisture from the reverse flaps would connect with the souvenir sheets affixed to face of each envelope if boxed too early.
;)
;)
The three members are Annette (?), Lizbe Gonsalves (centre) and Sharon Fairburn (right). The final count of the Bureau staff at the time of my leaving was 126 girls and 3 guys manually servicing some 30,000 collector accounts worldwide in the days prior computers. Wonderful times!
;)
;)
Two IMPERFORATE PROOF error souvenir sheets sent to the Bureau, but long forgotten about by me, were recently acquired from Dauwalder's stamp shop in Salisbury and are currently available in the POSTAL HISTORY SECTION of this shop. All incoming proofs from the printers were carefully stored under lock and key at the Bureau, but these, and other proofs, came onto the market probably through the activities of the agency handling the dreadful St. Vincent mass productions in later years.
;)
;)
During the construction of the Panama Canal much of the work was done in the Culebra Cut and many little villages including Las Cascadas were constructed along the west bank to house the thousands of contract workers, mostly from the Caribbean, who built the Culebra Cut, known to them as "Hell's Gorge" in temperatures mostly over 86 degrees Fahrenheit. The Cut was a trench 295 feet wide, 10 storeys deep, with a length of over 130 football fields, over 60 million pounds of dynamite was used. In 1908 Las Cascadas had 2,425 inhabitants - 957 whites, 1,424 blacks and 44 others.
;)
The attached reports the discovery by Wolfgang Fuchs of Munich of red ink GB/40c used at Biabou, written up for the British West Indies Study Circle journal.
;)
;)
I attach scans of the examples currently known to me. All appear on the 1880 QV 1d olive-green (SG.29), only one is dated having the abbreviated "CA" (used Calliaqua) JY 30 81. If you can provide scans of further examples please do so. I use Adobe photoshop and prefer small scans in perfect upright position (preferably against black background). I normally scan in Professional at 200 dpi and 50% ... they need to fit in the boxes!!! Thanks.
;)
My only references to the four labels (produced in orange, blue, yellow, and mauve) comes from an article in the British West Indies Study Circle Bulletin No.72, March 1972), and the pricing of flight covers and printing quantites as listed after St. Vincent Grenadines in the old Urch Harris catalogues. If you have any additional information, or have mint labels, I would be interested in scans etc.
;)