Discussion - Member to Member Sales - Research Center
Discussion - Member to Member Sales - Research Center
Stamp collecting can be a lonely endeavor. Yet, after many weeks, months, or years, we all have known that very special moment, the satisfaction of completing something really challenging, at long last.
We now want a pat on the back, a well deserved series of "ooohhhs" and "aaahhhs", and gushing praise flowing like Niagara unimpeded by ice.
So I am starting this Discussion Board thread for the purpose of giving ALL of you a chance to share with us what you have just completed lately, most likely in solitude after much hard work. You are now done (with this task, anyways), so share it with fellow collectors who can really appreciate your accomplishment!
This is where you get to show off for the rest of us.
As far as comments from readers are concerned, which I would encourage without reserve, we will only tolerate praise here! Unabashed and unmitigated praise. So, lay it on as thick as guacamole on a chip. Pour on the honey!
And to get it all started, after a decade of patient search for reasonably priced stamps to fill my missing Scott #65 (Y & T #62) ( 2c N under B) and my missing Scott #79 (Y & T #76) (10c N under U), I have just completed the full France 1876-1890 Peace and Commerce series (known as Type Sage). What are the chances of getting both stamps at low prices the very same week (after 5 years of waiting for that special "bargain", my absolute criteria for buying these "little pieces of used paper")?
To do it justice, I had to redesign the standard Scott specialty album pages I use for my collection (too crowded for my taste). Now the stamps are more esthetically displayed, and here they are to share with you all! Just need to type up the captions for completion, but I can no longer wait!
What have you accomplished lately (philatelically speaking) that you are willing to share? Time to show off!
rrr...
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Ralph, those are beautiful! Congratulations! I hope to follow in your footsteps in another decade or so... 
-Steve
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A good idea for a thread!
As you may know, if you've been paying attention — ��
� — I've been working a web page about the German occupation of the Channel Islands in the Second World War.
A couple of years ago, I had never heard of the message scheme of the International Committee of the Red Cross, which tasked itself with the job of making it possible for civilians in combat areas to communicate with friends and relatives abroad. The scheme included the Channel Islands.
Among the "postal" artifacts I have purchased is this copy of Red Cross Form 61, the basic document used to facilitate that communication. This particular one was produced in Germany:
On eBay, I found a copy of The Red Cross Mail Service for Channel Island Civilians — 1940-45, by Donald McKenzie. He identifies 20 different varieties of Form 61. In attempting to identify the German form I have, I discovered that it is neither sub-type 1D or sub-type 1E, and includes characteristics of both. To explain: In sub-type 1D, the umlauts over "3. Emphänger antwortet unseitig" are angled lines, in sub-type 1E they are dots. The length in mm of "1. Absender," "2. Emphanger," and "3. Emphänger antwortet unseitig" match my form, but the umlaut over "3. Emphänger antwortet unseitig" are dots.
I am generally not a flyspeck collector, but this one intrigues me. Have I discovered a hitherto unknown variety? Doe anyone care? 
s Nevertheless, I had fun. Soon, I'll be providing you with a link to the completed Channel Islands pages.
Bob
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Congratulations Ralph. That is a dream of mine as well.
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Beautiful hand drawn pages. Thanks for sharing!
MArk
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Very Well done !!! Great job.
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Two comments:
1) I really enjoyed seeing your accomplishment and would like to add my "Well done!"
2) I REALLY like this idea! Let's see more completed sets!
Lars
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Hello everybody...
First of all please excuse the imaging. I'm starting to see that a really good scanner would make SOR much more fun. I recently finished the Q1-Q12 Parcel Post. Super excited to complete this page because Q10 and Q12 were not easy. I sort of compromised a little because the 50c and 1 dollar values are used and the rest are not. It was actually more challenging though because I looked for a long, long time for used copies that I could live with and afford. Hey, maybe I'll "upgrade" the rest to used so they'll match the others! I find the hunt just as satisfying as the kill. Would love to hear feedback on these. Thanks in advance, Ernie
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SWEET Q10 with unobtrusive cancel.
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Very gently cancelled Q12. Registry cancel???
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I havent put Q10 and Q12 in mounts yet.
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Ernie -
Love it! I agree, it's very satisfying to complete the set even if you intend to replace a few items in the future.
Well done!
Lars
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Thanks Lars,
I'm almost done with the small banknotes. They're on Scott National album pages. I'm kind of a freak with that album. It doesnt get handled unless the table or desk surface gets scrubbed and dried and hands are thoroughly washed and dried. Ha Ha
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Ernie got me motivated with those Parcel Post stamps. When I was putting together my Parcel Post page I won an auction for some PP stamps I needed. This was in the old days when you could contact the other bidders on eBay. Some random guy asked if I would be interested in making a trade. There was one stamp in the lot with a Reading, California cancel that he wanted, and he was kicking himself for not bidding more. He offered to send me TEN used Q10s, let me pick the one I wanted, and all I had to do was send back the other 9 with the one I won with a Reading cancel, and he would pay postage both ways.
I was suspicious at first, but he was assuming all risk, so why not. Transaction completed and he even offered many helpful tips. He seemed very concerned that I didn't have a Scott Specialized catalog yet, and gave me several other much needed pointers. Very nice guy. His name was Daniel Pagter. It wasn't until many years later that I realized he was (and maybe still is) one of the GIANTS in Parcel Post. Many of the examples in the Beecher and Wawrukiewicz section on Parcel Post are from his collection. The way that superstar treated this rookie is why I enjoy the company of the philatelic community so much.
But Ernie already showed Parcel Post, so I want to show something else that's closely related and mention another superstar: Alan Moll. I couldn't have made sense of it all without his help and if YOU don't have THIS in your US BOB, you are missing something special!
Some argue these aren't postage stamps, but they have a FV and when the FV was adjusted upward by USPS, they used postage stamps to do it.
This is an often neglected BOB area that warrants inclusion. It resides between Airmail and FDCs in the Scott Specialized along with Postage Dues, Officials and Special Delivery. Happy hunting!
Lars
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Very impressive both of you. Someday I will work on that part of my collection.
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Hey Lars, (or anybody else) I see on the album page it says these insurance stamps were from up until 1981. Did these pretty much serve the same function as the regular insurance that you can buy from them for a package today? If so it sounds like these were made obsolete by bar codes, computers and tracking.
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The insurance labels were purchased from post office vending machines. The buyer would affix the label to the parcel and would get minimal insurance coverage for the mailing. If more insurance was needed, the mailer would have to go to the counter to purchase that using a blue insurance form.
The insurance labels for minimal insurance were eventually replaced by a different process. The mailer would fill out a small ticket (I can't remember the color, but seem to recall it being green), present it to a clerk with the mail piece. The clerk would apply a circular "Insured" hand stamp to the parcel, and a round date cancel to the ticket. The mailer kept the ticket. One could purchase up to $200 in this manner. There was no tracking, and there was no signature obtained by the receiver of the mail. Later that label was replaced by the black insurance form. If over $200 insurance was needed, that is purchased by using the blue insurance form. Both the black and the blue insurance forms are tracked now.
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The key point with QI1-5 is that they represented a purchase and had a monetary value. If you buy insurance today you can pay for it with regular postage stamps and there is a separate, valueless sticker or other marking. QI1-5 was a way to purchase insurance without going to the window, so the stamp itself was purchased. QI1-5 are as much postage as Registered Mail (F1), Certified Mail (FA1), or Special Delivery (E1-23), and probably more so than Postage Dues (J1-104). It's an often overlooked area that is simply misunderstood. I was lucky enough to connect with Alan Moll when I put that section of my album together. He is the premier authority on Vended Postal Insurance.
Lars
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I used to have those labels. They were one of the areas I sold years ago when I cut back on what I collected.
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Chris, very nice! For those of us ignorant of France philately, can you tell us who Marianne is?
Lars
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Lars,
Yes, but I am by no mean an expert on France. But, Marianne the Goddess of Liberty and the national symbol of France. Therefore, she is found on quite a number for French stamps.
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Chris,
So Marianne on a stamp from France would be similar to the Statue of Liberty on a US stamp?
If so, that begs the question:
If the Statue of Liberty was a gift from France, was she based on Marianne?
Lars
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Marianne is the symbol of Republican France. A Marianne symbolically is a bust of a determined woman wearing a Phrygian cap. She symbolises the attachment of the common citizens of the revolution to the Republic - Marianne is liberty, equality and fraternity.
Most famous depiction is by painter Delacroix.
There are many iteration of the Marianne depicted in French stamps. You can read all about it here: http://www.abelard.org/france/marianne.php#marianne_on_stamps
After a generic depiction of Marianne in the early versions, the stamps of the female figure have been redesigned every few years since 1967, based on famous women.
For those who ask, the latest model used to depict Marianne is controversial as it is a mixture of many women but especially Inna Shevchenko, FEMEN founder (who is not French). Before that, the first stamp based on a famous French woman was modelled after Brigitte Bardot in 1968 (of course), as represented by sculptor Arslan.
Here is the list of the famous French models who inspired the various Mariannes, since 1968.
1) Brigitte Bardot 1968 (sculptor Aslan), 2) Michèle Morgan in 1972 (sculptor Bernard Potel) ; 3) Mireille Mathieu in 1978 (sculptor Aslan); 4) Catherine Deneuve in 1985 (sculptor Polska) ; 5) Inès de La Fressange (of Channel fame) in 1989; 6) Laetitia Casta in 2000 ( sculptor Marie Paule Deville-Chabrolle) ; 7) Évelyne Thomas (TV personality) in 2003..and a generic Marianne thereafter, including the composite latest version inspired by Shevchenko...appropriate, because Marianne is often depicted bare breasted.
How about this for pointless information!
rrr...
The 1944 Marianne shown above is known as the Marianne of Dulac, designed for Free French use at the request of De Gaulle during WW2. (Dulac was French born and British Naturalized)
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Excellent info!
Is there a connection between Marianne and the Statue of Liberty?
Lars
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Am I correct in remembering that the model for the Marianne stamps of the early 20th century died from starvation?
Lars, I did a little checking on your question. It is not that easily defined. I found two lines of thought:
1 - Marianne and The Statue of Liberty are sisters
2 - Marianne and The Statue of Liberty are one and the same
There is a strong argument against #2 in that Marianne is the symbol for France. I tend to go with #1.
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Wow! This sounds like a GREAT topic for further research!
And now for something completely different. Who is next to share?
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Before closing on the topic of Marianne, here is the complete precancelled set of Marianne of Gandon stamps. These are the only Marianne that are precancelled, for France.
This is Y & T precancelled numbers 94-104. All are fairly common, but not usually found in collections.
rrr...
"Am I correct in remembering that the model for the Marianne stamps of the early 20th century died from starvation?"
Maybe that is what you are referring to?
rrr..
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So Marianne, Brittania and Lady Liberty are all symbolic/allegorical figures. Do any other countries have similar figures?
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Great info on Marianne! Much more than I was aware. Great opportunity to learn something I didn't know. This is why stamp collectors are so smart 
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Arguably, this is one of the most informative and interesting threads I have encountered. Thank-you all. My goodness! I didn't even know she got off the island.
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There is some thought that the Phrygian bonnet associated with Marianne was comtemplated for Liberty but was changed to a spiky crown.
Marianne may also have a cousin in Helvetia of Switzerland
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It's always pleasing to fill a set of stamps from two separate dealers, neither of whom has the full set. This is what happened yesterday, when Andy had two and Howard three of the stamps shown below:
This will be a familiar image to those of you who have had a look at my article on the designer Dubasov in the relevant section on this website. It was the first set designed by the man who was to become Head Artist at the Soviet Printing Works in Moscow (Goznak), when he was an unknown 24-year-old.
The story goes that the young man read in Izvestia about a competition to design a set of stamps to mark the fifth anniversary of the founding of the Russian state. He duly entered, alongside several veteran designers from the Tsarist days, and conceived the design shown above, using his next-door neighbour as a model for the muscular stone-carver.
Doubtless to his surprise, he won! The prize was a billion roubles, perhaps not as much as it sounds in those days of hyper-inflation. Indeed he said later that it was sufficient to buy a new pair of boots for his young wife Vera.
I'm not sure what happened to the paper on the 45r. value and I guess I'll replace it for something more like the others if I get the chance, but it was a pleasant way to complete the set (and I had not come across the story when I wrote the original article!).
By the way, I always trim my imperforates. Do you?
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"By the way, I always trim my imperforates. Do you?"
No I haven't. I have a lot of imperf Franklins and haven't touched one yet.
Nice set of stamps. It's cool when you can put something together via the Internet. Where people had said the Internet would be the death of hobbies, it's actually helped us a whole lot!
Works the same way in the model car world! I had an obscure 1968 era model kit that was missing some key parts. It was worth much less this way, and couldn't be built, which was my aim. In the old days it was tough to find parts or research materials. You could call your friends one at a time, or wait until your monthly club meeting. You'd ask the group and someone would say they could help. Now you waited until the next meeting... then the person would say they didn't have it or forgot to bring it! So you were at least 2 months into finding what you needed, and often fruitless.
With the Internet, the model guys have message boards just like this one. I posted out there that I needed these specific parts, and nearly instantly I got two replies from guys who each had part of what I needed. One was in the Netherlands, the other in Germany! That shows just how wide your reach is today!
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I would never trim an imperforate. I would be worried about trimming it to the point of not being able to tell if it was a regular perforated stamp that had been trimmed.
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"By the way, I always trim my imperforates. Do you?"
I don't. I would say that generally with any imperforate of any value, the larger the margins, the better.
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I can only remember trimming one edge of an imperf, because it was so uneven it just looked bad. It looked much better after the trimming, which was the whole idea in the first place. Otherwise I would rather keep the stamps as they are received.
Mike
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When you come by an imperforate single, it stands to reason that someone else has trimmed it before you got it. Since that trimming was almost certainly done by a post office employee with speed in mind, rather than neat appearance, I feel no compunction in tidying up their work where necessary.
This rationale sustains my view that stamps in a collection should be displayed as neatly and carefully as possible. I would no more allow a rough, sloping, broken or uneven trim on an imperforate stamp than a poorly squared-off mount or a misspelled write-up on an album page.
There will be imperforate stamps of such vintage and worth that possession of a poor trim is preferable to no possession at all, and obviously you do not want to alter any stamp for the worse. But such stamps do not form part of my collection.
Therefore I risk attracting more dismay by revealing that in addition I remove and discard selvage from all perforate stamps (except Israel, where the selvage is deliberately part of the entire design), and I also try to remove those tiny circular bits where the perforation blade has not pierced the paper completely, using a deft pinching motion with my tweezers while taking due care not to damage the stamp itself.
Such revelations should now have successfully distanced me from the orbit of all serious philatelists, which is a pity, but only goes to show that it takes all sorts!
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Guthrum,
I share your view for the most part with the following important exceptions:
1) Commonly faked imperfs (such as US 315) should probably be left untrimmed. You can, of course, do as you wish with YOUR stamps, but you may destroy the value for your heirs if you trim it. For a stamp that isn't commonly faked, I would probably square up the margins as well.
2) I often remove selvage, including plate numbers, to make the presentation cleaner. However, some selvage can be used to identify a stamp. For example,
it's easy to tell at a glace which is 1580 and which is 1580B - no perf gauge required!
It's also easy to tell that the stamps at top came from a sheet and aren't booklet singles:
Selvage can also differentiate Wet/dry printings, and you don't even have to have a plate single. Look at the location of the guide lines:
Sometimes the images spills out onto the selvage:
And this oddity would be a lot harder to spot, document or explain without selvage:
Of course, Kim is happy to accept any discarded selvage!
Lars
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Here is a MNH pair of the Machin "Horizon" labels I got a little while ago.
Chimo
Bujutsu
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Those are neat labels. What are they used for? Looks like trial proofs or something.
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They are labels for printing postage rates or values on, much like the USPS post office meter with the eagle and the bar of pink ink at the top.
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Thanks Smauggie! That makes perfect sense. Is that a picture of you near one of the locks of the Panama Canal? Very cool picture. I see one of your interests in Canal Zone postage.
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I am actually in one of the lock chambers on a 35ft launch. We had to share it with the big ship you see behind me. It is a bit daunting to be in a giant tub on a motorboat being overshadowed by a full-size tanker. It played nice, though. 
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Smauggie beat me to the punch.
I got these labels from a friend in mine from the UK. I figured they were something different for my collection.
Chimo
Bujutsu
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Thanks for those pics Lars! I might be able to use the wet-dry image to help identify a few sets of each to use as a guide.
-Steve
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So here is my one and only purchase from the stamp show yesterday. Nice 90c stamp. The picture doesnt do it justice. Fantastic deep color on this one. And the best part is.... the price! I paid less than 20% catalog value.
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What a great find of a beautiful stamp and at a bargain price. Good for you Ernie.
Mike
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Thanks mike! I got to looking at the cat value again and I actually paid 24.5% of current used value but here's the catch...Scott cat value for used is for stamps in "VF" condition which this stamp is not. I think I would call the centering of this stamp "F-VF" and it does have a trivial thin spot on the back. All things considered I don't think it was a bad price. One thing I've learned about my self and collecting is that regardless how pretty a stamp is, if I think I paid too much I won't look at it the same lol.
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Ernie,
that's a fabulous stamp at a good price. Very light cancel, four margins, even if not perfectly centered. I think it a great price for a great stamp.
David
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I agree. I think that stamp is worth more than 25% of CV. Perhaps as much as 50% with the centering and thin. Great find!
Lars
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That was a great price for that stamp. It's going to be hard to find a copy like that without a thin. It even has great perfs!
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This was selling for $30 at the last club meeting. Not my typical purchase, but something about it appealed to me so I brought it home.
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That's cheap! Handsome stamp. Cool!
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Some people look for souvineers when they travel...i look for stamps and covers ! Heres a plum i picked out of an antique dealers postacard box in London !!!
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Heres the waterboy on the picture side !!!
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Charlie was obviously on active service in Cairo in November 1915 - I expect the inverted message was due to youthful carelessness (I had to invert my laptop to read it!). I wonder whether he survived the Great War.
And finally, I wonder if we are looking at the house his mother lived in here:
http://www.primelocation.com/for-sale/details/32990838#XLjeokwelrgBYtpz.97
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They must have added the sun room later !
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Dude, wait a sec.... is that link that guthrum posted the exact address to where that post card was mailed??? A. If it is wow! That he found it and B. What a sweet homestead! I'm moving to Halifax!
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A couple of clues:
1. No house number or name is mentioned, other than 'Upper Stubbins Triangle', either on the postcard from 1915 or in the estate agent's list a century later. This suggests that this was (and may remain) the only big house in the area.
2. It's clearly a house that would have been there in 1915. The sort of place a young army officer might have been brought up in, perhaps.
It's not conclusive evidence, I realise, but it's a possible!
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i will never make detective !
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I love Google Maps! I very often look up addresses on my 1903-8 era covers. Sometimes I'm rewarded with a street view of an 1850s house where I can imagine my cover being delivered to! Other times I find a view of tall commercial buildings where there must've been a neighborhood in my era, but long gone in the name of progress.
Very interesting none the less!
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Hi Philb , the family of Crawshaw lived at 2 Upper Stubbins, Triangle, Sowerby, Yorks. in the 1911 census, image below. However there was no Charlie/ Charles in the family. I have checked census and birth records back to 1864.
There was a Charlie born in 1900 but not sure yet where he fits in. Would he not have been a little young to be on foreign service in 1915?
There is a family tree on Ancestry and I have written the owner to ask if he can shed any light on this.
If needed could I have permission to send him a copy of the card?
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Sheepshanks. Awesome work maybe he was dating one of their daughters lol
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09:29:26pm
Rather than clutter this thread up any further, I have posted a detailed answer to the question asked above somewhere "... What are they ( Large gold UK Horizon Labels ) for ?..." that Chemo illustrated with a scan.
Go Here
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Sheepshanks..Permission Granted !
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Ok so the plot gets darker. There was a Charles Bottomley Crawshaw born 1899, died 1974,
who on marriage banns in 1931 gave his father as Walter Crawshaw.
In the 1911 census at 5 Upper Stubbins, Triangle, there is a Bottomley family of Philip aged 49, Annie (wife) aged 47 and Percy (son)aged 14. could they be connected? Could Alice be the mother of an illegitimate Charles, with Walter as father?
Without a birth certificate it is hard to be certain, hopefully the Ancestry tree owner will come up with an answer.
Stay tuned for the next exciting instalment.
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I think I shall be truly happy if, even for a little while, I can have 'Upper Stubbins' as an address.
But alas, I shall never reach those lofty heights. Lower Stubbins befits my station. Or perhaps Under Stubbins.
I love this thread.
Mark
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We know the father is Harry ("Mrs H.Crawshaw"), the mother is Julia. However, "mother" in the letter may be an honorary title - I don't think Charlie is Julia's son. Mabel was born a year after Harry and Julia married and they have no other children by 1911.
Walter could be Harry's brother, but that still leaves a 16-year old out in Cairo on active service. (I think illegitimacy is highly unlikely - you didn't keep illegitimate children in the family in those days - you sent them for adoption.) Does that really look like the handwriting of a 16-year-old?
It's an odd little message: "Have found a sweetheart for you, how do you think you'll like him."!
It'll remain a mystery unless we get more evidence...
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No answer from Ancestry yet but it is always possible that Charlie is the husband Harry, maybe a second christian or pet name for him. A lot of Northern folk referred to the wife as "mother" and I believe still do to this day.
As far as I have researched there is not a Walter in Harry's immediate family but they could be cousins and are no doubt related somewhere along the line.
Vic
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Here is a real "KILLER" of a cancel. Any ideas where they used this mean machine?
Mike
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doubt it's a machine; more likely a cork cancel
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ALEXANDRETTA...I finally finished it!
The last series of 5 stamps on page 1, fairly hard to find, commemorate the death of Ataturk.
Fascinating history for the region, (and now so much in the news as of late). Here is some brief history
""From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia (edited)
The Sanjak of Alexandretta (Turkish: İskenderun Sancağı, French: Sandjak d'Alexandrette, Arabic: سنجق الإسكندرونة‎ Sanjaq al-Iskandarūna) was a Mandate of Syria composed of Alexandretta and Antioch, present day İskenderun and Antakya, and became autonomous under Article 7 of the French-Turkish treaty of October 20, 1921: "A special administrative regime shall be established for the district of Alexandretta. The Turkish inhabitants of this district shall enjoy facility for their cultural development. The Turkish language shall have official recognition". This was due to the presence of an important Turkish community along with Arabs of various religious denominations.
In 1923 Alexandretta was attached to the State of Aleppo, and in 1925 it was directly attached to the French mandate of Syria, still with special administrative status.
Map showing the states of the French mandate states
French Mandate
Of Philatelic Interest are the stamps of Alaouites, Alexandretta, Hatay, Latakia, Rouad, Syria and Lebanon, all issued during the French Mandate of post WW1 Ottoman empire breakout territories.
The 1936 elections in the sanjak returned two MPs favoring the independence of Syria from France, and this prompted communal riots as well as passionate articles in the Turkish and Syrian press. The sanjak was given autonomy in November 1937 in an arrangement brokered by the League. Under its new statute, the sanjak became 'distinct but not separated' from the French Mandate of Syria on the diplomatic level, linked to both France and Turkey for defence matters.
1938 voter registration and "elections"
Turkish forces entered Ä°skenderun on July 5, 1938.
The allocation of seats in the sanjak assembly was based on the 1938 census held by the French authorities under international supervision: out of 40 seats, 22 were given to the Turks, nine for Alawi Arabs, five for Armenians, two for Sunni Arabs, and two for Christian Arabs. This repartition was the result of a Turkish military intervention from Payas and Hassa just beforehand, on July 5, 1938, with the ethnic cleansing of most of its Arab and Armenian inhabitants who constituted the majority of the population. Turkey had also crossed tens of thousands of Turks into the Sanjak of Alexandretta. These were Turks born in Hatay who were now living elsewhere in Turkey. In two government communiqués in 1937 and 1938, the Turkish government asked all local government authorities to make lists of their employees originally from Hatay. Those who listed were then sent to Hatay to register as citizens and vote. Moreover, the results seemed to be questionable because it happened for the sole purpose of seat repartition. (note...padding the ballot, still done in my old town of Chicago lol)
On September 2, 1938, the assembly proclaimed the Sanjak of Alexandretta as the Hatay State. The State lasted for one year under joint French and Turkish military supervision. The name "Hatay" itself was proposed by Atatürk and the government was under Turkish control.
The Hatay State became the Hatay Province of Turkey in 1939.
My philatelic goal for this year is to complete the collections of all the French Mandate States of the former Ottoman Empire!
rrr....
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Fantastic RRR! So the only thing that designates these as coming from Alexandretta is the overprint? Are false overprints ever an issue with these?
-Ernie
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Ernie...I really don't know how bad it is...but the need to be careful with ALL overprints applies, especially those coming from this part of the world.
We should ask our resident expert, Nelson. As far as the stamps I scanned, I am pretty sure (given their origin, many were from correspondence from my Grandfather who worked there for a while) that they are authentic. I cannot vouch for the last few Ataturk Death o/p I acquired recently. I know that Rouad has a problem especially for Rouad #1-3...so my guess is that if it has a high philatelic value, you should be very careful. Their usage was limited, so there are no fakes used to cheat the post office...just collectors like you and me.
Would love to hear what Nelson has to say. rrr...
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"Expert" 
- just an interested observer!
I honestly have not spent much effort on these so this is a casual observation.
Are they being faked? - do they have overprints - then absolutely!
Given the very short time these were issued and where they come from, they are prime targets.
From this far away vantage
The 10-11-1938 ovpt. on yours look good. The 9, 3 and 1 appear to vary so it would be good to get a genuine block to compare variations.
This group has a lot of variation in the overprints that show up.
In this group I believe the key is the shape of the 2 t's and the x which are distinct.
The crooks will probably mess up that first S also.
In this group the D'ALEX is larger.
I had not looked for forgeries but as I was writing this I had a quick look & found this one on the right immediately, on a "decent" auction site. eBay has MANY of this series for sale - too many!
Overall, yours look fine
The last group I did not check
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Michael...good memory!
The Scott #17 was the last holdout. Finally got it, in what looked like authentic not counterfeit condition, and at a decent price.
You are right..there are a few more, I will post a scan for those who are interested.
(o/p out of focus due to cheap scanner...the stamps are better)
That is all of Alexandretta!
rrr...
And for the cancellation specialist:
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Nelson...you are right...way too many offered on ebay.
Some look particularly doubtful...here are 2 where the 10-11-1938 in particular, was probably added to a real Alexandretta stamp. The second one does not look like it is Mint either.
For those interested, see if you can spot the warning signs (currently on ebay):
compare these with a good one (I am pretty sure) from my collection:
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Rrr, is it that the 10-11-1938 is much darker???
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Ernie, no, I enhanced the photo to sharpen a picture that needed help, focussing just on the o/p shape. Reposting straight out of the camera, so please excuse the out-of focus aspect:
rrr....
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I am proud as a peacock! I have just completed France 1876-1890 Peace and Commerce series (known as Type Sage), without breaking the bank!
Stamp collecting can be a lonely endeavor. Yet, after many weeks, months, or years, we all have known that very special moment, the satisfaction of completing something really challenging, at long last.
We now want a pat on the back, a well deserved series of "ooohhhs" and "aaahhhs", and gushing praise flowing like Niagara unimpeded by ice.
So I am starting this Discussion Board thread for the purpose of giving ALL of you a chance to share with us what you have just completed lately, most likely in solitude after much hard work. You are now done (with this task, anyways), so share it with fellow collectors who can really appreciate your accomplishment!
This is where you get to show off for the rest of us.
As far as comments from readers are concerned, which I would encourage without reserve, we will only tolerate praise here! Unabashed and unmitigated praise. So, lay it on as thick as guacamole on a chip. Pour on the honey!
And to get it all started, after a decade of patient search for reasonably priced stamps to fill my missing Scott #65 (Y & T #62) ( 2c N under B) and my missing Scott #79 (Y & T #76) (10c N under U), I have just completed the full France 1876-1890 Peace and Commerce series (known as Type Sage). What are the chances of getting both stamps at low prices the very same week (after 5 years of waiting for that special "bargain", my absolute criteria for buying these "little pieces of used paper")?
To do it justice, I had to redesign the standard Scott specialty album pages I use for my collection (too crowded for my taste). Now the stamps are more esthetically displayed, and here they are to share with you all! Just need to type up the captions for completion, but I can no longer wait!
What have you accomplished lately (philatelically speaking) that you are willing to share? Time to show off!
rrr...
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Ralph, those are beautiful! Congratulations! I hope to follow in your footsteps in another decade or so...
-Steve
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A good idea for a thread!
As you may know, if you've been paying attention — ��� — I've been working a web page about the German occupation of the Channel Islands in the Second World War.
A couple of years ago, I had never heard of the message scheme of the International Committee of the Red Cross, which tasked itself with the job of making it possible for civilians in combat areas to communicate with friends and relatives abroad. The scheme included the Channel Islands.
Among the "postal" artifacts I have purchased is this copy of Red Cross Form 61, the basic document used to facilitate that communication. This particular one was produced in Germany:
On eBay, I found a copy of The Red Cross Mail Service for Channel Island Civilians — 1940-45, by Donald McKenzie. He identifies 20 different varieties of Form 61. In attempting to identify the German form I have, I discovered that it is neither sub-type 1D or sub-type 1E, and includes characteristics of both. To explain: In sub-type 1D, the umlauts over "3. Emphänger antwortet unseitig" are angled lines, in sub-type 1E they are dots. The length in mm of "1. Absender," "2. Emphanger," and "3. Emphänger antwortet unseitig" match my form, but the umlaut over "3. Emphänger antwortet unseitig" are dots.
I am generally not a flyspeck collector, but this one intrigues me. Have I discovered a hitherto unknown variety? Doe anyone care? s Nevertheless, I had fun. Soon, I'll be providing you with a link to the completed Channel Islands pages.
Bob
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Congratulations Ralph. That is a dream of mine as well.
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Beautiful hand drawn pages. Thanks for sharing!
MArk
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Very Well done !!! Great job.
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Two comments:
1) I really enjoyed seeing your accomplishment and would like to add my "Well done!"
2) I REALLY like this idea! Let's see more completed sets!
Lars
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Hello everybody...
First of all please excuse the imaging. I'm starting to see that a really good scanner would make SOR much more fun. I recently finished the Q1-Q12 Parcel Post. Super excited to complete this page because Q10 and Q12 were not easy. I sort of compromised a little because the 50c and 1 dollar values are used and the rest are not. It was actually more challenging though because I looked for a long, long time for used copies that I could live with and afford. Hey, maybe I'll "upgrade" the rest to used so they'll match the others! I find the hunt just as satisfying as the kill. Would love to hear feedback on these. Thanks in advance, Ernie
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08:48:13pm
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SWEET Q10 with unobtrusive cancel.
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08:49:41pm
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Very gently cancelled Q12. Registry cancel???
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08:50:59pm
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I havent put Q10 and Q12 in mounts yet.
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Ernie -
Love it! I agree, it's very satisfying to complete the set even if you intend to replace a few items in the future.
Well done!
Lars
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09:15:18pm
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Thanks Lars,
I'm almost done with the small banknotes. They're on Scott National album pages. I'm kind of a freak with that album. It doesnt get handled unless the table or desk surface gets scrubbed and dried and hands are thoroughly washed and dried. Ha Ha
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Ernie got me motivated with those Parcel Post stamps. When I was putting together my Parcel Post page I won an auction for some PP stamps I needed. This was in the old days when you could contact the other bidders on eBay. Some random guy asked if I would be interested in making a trade. There was one stamp in the lot with a Reading, California cancel that he wanted, and he was kicking himself for not bidding more. He offered to send me TEN used Q10s, let me pick the one I wanted, and all I had to do was send back the other 9 with the one I won with a Reading cancel, and he would pay postage both ways.
I was suspicious at first, but he was assuming all risk, so why not. Transaction completed and he even offered many helpful tips. He seemed very concerned that I didn't have a Scott Specialized catalog yet, and gave me several other much needed pointers. Very nice guy. His name was Daniel Pagter. It wasn't until many years later that I realized he was (and maybe still is) one of the GIANTS in Parcel Post. Many of the examples in the Beecher and Wawrukiewicz section on Parcel Post are from his collection. The way that superstar treated this rookie is why I enjoy the company of the philatelic community so much.
But Ernie already showed Parcel Post, so I want to show something else that's closely related and mention another superstar: Alan Moll. I couldn't have made sense of it all without his help and if YOU don't have THIS in your US BOB, you are missing something special!
Some argue these aren't postage stamps, but they have a FV and when the FV was adjusted upward by USPS, they used postage stamps to do it.
This is an often neglected BOB area that warrants inclusion. It resides between Airmail and FDCs in the Scott Specialized along with Postage Dues, Officials and Special Delivery. Happy hunting!
Lars
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Very impressive both of you. Someday I will work on that part of my collection.
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06:41:26pm
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Hey Lars, (or anybody else) I see on the album page it says these insurance stamps were from up until 1981. Did these pretty much serve the same function as the regular insurance that you can buy from them for a package today? If so it sounds like these were made obsolete by bar codes, computers and tracking.
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11:38:58pm
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The insurance labels were purchased from post office vending machines. The buyer would affix the label to the parcel and would get minimal insurance coverage for the mailing. If more insurance was needed, the mailer would have to go to the counter to purchase that using a blue insurance form.
The insurance labels for minimal insurance were eventually replaced by a different process. The mailer would fill out a small ticket (I can't remember the color, but seem to recall it being green), present it to a clerk with the mail piece. The clerk would apply a circular "Insured" hand stamp to the parcel, and a round date cancel to the ticket. The mailer kept the ticket. One could purchase up to $200 in this manner. There was no tracking, and there was no signature obtained by the receiver of the mail. Later that label was replaced by the black insurance form. If over $200 insurance was needed, that is purchased by using the blue insurance form. Both the black and the blue insurance forms are tracked now.
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The key point with QI1-5 is that they represented a purchase and had a monetary value. If you buy insurance today you can pay for it with regular postage stamps and there is a separate, valueless sticker or other marking. QI1-5 was a way to purchase insurance without going to the window, so the stamp itself was purchased. QI1-5 are as much postage as Registered Mail (F1), Certified Mail (FA1), or Special Delivery (E1-23), and probably more so than Postage Dues (J1-104). It's an often overlooked area that is simply misunderstood. I was lucky enough to connect with Alan Moll when I put that section of my album together. He is the premier authority on Vended Postal Insurance.
Lars
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10:24:54am
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I used to have those labels. They were one of the areas I sold years ago when I cut back on what I collected.
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Chris, very nice! For those of us ignorant of France philately, can you tell us who Marianne is?
Lars
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Lars,
Yes, but I am by no mean an expert on France. But, Marianne the Goddess of Liberty and the national symbol of France. Therefore, she is found on quite a number for French stamps.
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Chris,
So Marianne on a stamp from France would be similar to the Statue of Liberty on a US stamp?
If so, that begs the question:
If the Statue of Liberty was a gift from France, was she based on Marianne?
Lars
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Marianne is the symbol of Republican France. A Marianne symbolically is a bust of a determined woman wearing a Phrygian cap. She symbolises the attachment of the common citizens of the revolution to the Republic - Marianne is liberty, equality and fraternity.
Most famous depiction is by painter Delacroix.
There are many iteration of the Marianne depicted in French stamps. You can read all about it here: http://www.abelard.org/france/marianne.php#marianne_on_stamps
After a generic depiction of Marianne in the early versions, the stamps of the female figure have been redesigned every few years since 1967, based on famous women.
For those who ask, the latest model used to depict Marianne is controversial as it is a mixture of many women but especially Inna Shevchenko, FEMEN founder (who is not French). Before that, the first stamp based on a famous French woman was modelled after Brigitte Bardot in 1968 (of course), as represented by sculptor Arslan.
Here is the list of the famous French models who inspired the various Mariannes, since 1968.
1) Brigitte Bardot 1968 (sculptor Aslan), 2) Michèle Morgan in 1972 (sculptor Bernard Potel) ; 3) Mireille Mathieu in 1978 (sculptor Aslan); 4) Catherine Deneuve in 1985 (sculptor Polska) ; 5) Inès de La Fressange (of Channel fame) in 1989; 6) Laetitia Casta in 2000 ( sculptor Marie Paule Deville-Chabrolle) ; 7) Évelyne Thomas (TV personality) in 2003..and a generic Marianne thereafter, including the composite latest version inspired by Shevchenko...appropriate, because Marianne is often depicted bare breasted.
How about this for pointless information!
rrr...
The 1944 Marianne shown above is known as the Marianne of Dulac, designed for Free French use at the request of De Gaulle during WW2. (Dulac was French born and British Naturalized)
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Excellent info!
Is there a connection between Marianne and the Statue of Liberty?
Lars
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12:29:50am
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Am I correct in remembering that the model for the Marianne stamps of the early 20th century died from starvation?
Lars, I did a little checking on your question. It is not that easily defined. I found two lines of thought:
1 - Marianne and The Statue of Liberty are sisters
2 - Marianne and The Statue of Liberty are one and the same
There is a strong argument against #2 in that Marianne is the symbol for France. I tend to go with #1.
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Wow! This sounds like a GREAT topic for further research!
And now for something completely different. Who is next to share?
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Before closing on the topic of Marianne, here is the complete precancelled set of Marianne of Gandon stamps. These are the only Marianne that are precancelled, for France.
This is Y & T precancelled numbers 94-104. All are fairly common, but not usually found in collections.
rrr...
"Am I correct in remembering that the model for the Marianne stamps of the early 20th century died from starvation?"
Maybe that is what you are referring to?
rrr..
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06:22:51am
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So Marianne, Brittania and Lady Liberty are all symbolic/allegorical figures. Do any other countries have similar figures?
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Great info on Marianne! Much more than I was aware. Great opportunity to learn something I didn't know. This is why stamp collectors are so smart
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Arguably, this is one of the most informative and interesting threads I have encountered. Thank-you all. My goodness! I didn't even know she got off the island.
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09:04:39am
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There is some thought that the Phrygian bonnet associated with Marianne was comtemplated for Liberty but was changed to a spiky crown.
Marianne may also have a cousin in Helvetia of Switzerland
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It's always pleasing to fill a set of stamps from two separate dealers, neither of whom has the full set. This is what happened yesterday, when Andy had two and Howard three of the stamps shown below:
This will be a familiar image to those of you who have had a look at my article on the designer Dubasov in the relevant section on this website. It was the first set designed by the man who was to become Head Artist at the Soviet Printing Works in Moscow (Goznak), when he was an unknown 24-year-old.
The story goes that the young man read in Izvestia about a competition to design a set of stamps to mark the fifth anniversary of the founding of the Russian state. He duly entered, alongside several veteran designers from the Tsarist days, and conceived the design shown above, using his next-door neighbour as a model for the muscular stone-carver.
Doubtless to his surprise, he won! The prize was a billion roubles, perhaps not as much as it sounds in those days of hyper-inflation. Indeed he said later that it was sufficient to buy a new pair of boots for his young wife Vera.
I'm not sure what happened to the paper on the 45r. value and I guess I'll replace it for something more like the others if I get the chance, but it was a pleasant way to complete the set (and I had not come across the story when I wrote the original article!).
By the way, I always trim my imperforates. Do you?
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"By the way, I always trim my imperforates. Do you?"
No I haven't. I have a lot of imperf Franklins and haven't touched one yet.
Nice set of stamps. It's cool when you can put something together via the Internet. Where people had said the Internet would be the death of hobbies, it's actually helped us a whole lot!
Works the same way in the model car world! I had an obscure 1968 era model kit that was missing some key parts. It was worth much less this way, and couldn't be built, which was my aim. In the old days it was tough to find parts or research materials. You could call your friends one at a time, or wait until your monthly club meeting. You'd ask the group and someone would say they could help. Now you waited until the next meeting... then the person would say they didn't have it or forgot to bring it! So you were at least 2 months into finding what you needed, and often fruitless.
With the Internet, the model guys have message boards just like this one. I posted out there that I needed these specific parts, and nearly instantly I got two replies from guys who each had part of what I needed. One was in the Netherlands, the other in Germany! That shows just how wide your reach is today!
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I would never trim an imperforate. I would be worried about trimming it to the point of not being able to tell if it was a regular perforated stamp that had been trimmed.
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"By the way, I always trim my imperforates. Do you?"
I don't. I would say that generally with any imperforate of any value, the larger the margins, the better.
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I can only remember trimming one edge of an imperf, because it was so uneven it just looked bad. It looked much better after the trimming, which was the whole idea in the first place. Otherwise I would rather keep the stamps as they are received.
Mike
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When you come by an imperforate single, it stands to reason that someone else has trimmed it before you got it. Since that trimming was almost certainly done by a post office employee with speed in mind, rather than neat appearance, I feel no compunction in tidying up their work where necessary.
This rationale sustains my view that stamps in a collection should be displayed as neatly and carefully as possible. I would no more allow a rough, sloping, broken or uneven trim on an imperforate stamp than a poorly squared-off mount or a misspelled write-up on an album page.
There will be imperforate stamps of such vintage and worth that possession of a poor trim is preferable to no possession at all, and obviously you do not want to alter any stamp for the worse. But such stamps do not form part of my collection.
Therefore I risk attracting more dismay by revealing that in addition I remove and discard selvage from all perforate stamps (except Israel, where the selvage is deliberately part of the entire design), and I also try to remove those tiny circular bits where the perforation blade has not pierced the paper completely, using a deft pinching motion with my tweezers while taking due care not to damage the stamp itself.
Such revelations should now have successfully distanced me from the orbit of all serious philatelists, which is a pity, but only goes to show that it takes all sorts!
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Guthrum,
I share your view for the most part with the following important exceptions:
1) Commonly faked imperfs (such as US 315) should probably be left untrimmed. You can, of course, do as you wish with YOUR stamps, but you may destroy the value for your heirs if you trim it. For a stamp that isn't commonly faked, I would probably square up the margins as well.
2) I often remove selvage, including plate numbers, to make the presentation cleaner. However, some selvage can be used to identify a stamp. For example,
it's easy to tell at a glace which is 1580 and which is 1580B - no perf gauge required!
It's also easy to tell that the stamps at top came from a sheet and aren't booklet singles:
Selvage can also differentiate Wet/dry printings, and you don't even have to have a plate single. Look at the location of the guide lines:
Sometimes the images spills out onto the selvage:
And this oddity would be a lot harder to spot, document or explain without selvage:
Of course, Kim is happy to accept any discarded selvage!
Lars
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Here is a MNH pair of the Machin "Horizon" labels I got a little while ago.
Chimo
Bujutsu
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01:24:25pm
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Those are neat labels. What are they used for? Looks like trial proofs or something.
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They are labels for printing postage rates or values on, much like the USPS post office meter with the eagle and the bar of pink ink at the top.
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12:29:17pm
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Thanks Smauggie! That makes perfect sense. Is that a picture of you near one of the locks of the Panama Canal? Very cool picture. I see one of your interests in Canal Zone postage.
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I am actually in one of the lock chambers on a 35ft launch. We had to share it with the big ship you see behind me. It is a bit daunting to be in a giant tub on a motorboat being overshadowed by a full-size tanker. It played nice, though.
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Smauggie beat me to the punch.
I got these labels from a friend in mine from the UK. I figured they were something different for my collection.
Chimo
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Thanks for those pics Lars! I might be able to use the wet-dry image to help identify a few sets of each to use as a guide.
-Steve
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09:13:11am
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So here is my one and only purchase from the stamp show yesterday. Nice 90c stamp. The picture doesnt do it justice. Fantastic deep color on this one. And the best part is.... the price! I paid less than 20% catalog value.
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What a great find of a beautiful stamp and at a bargain price. Good for you Ernie.
Mike
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10:40:36am
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Thanks mike! I got to looking at the cat value again and I actually paid 24.5% of current used value but here's the catch...Scott cat value for used is for stamps in "VF" condition which this stamp is not. I think I would call the centering of this stamp "F-VF" and it does have a trivial thin spot on the back. All things considered I don't think it was a bad price. One thing I've learned about my self and collecting is that regardless how pretty a stamp is, if I think I paid too much I won't look at it the same lol.
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Ernie,
that's a fabulous stamp at a good price. Very light cancel, four margins, even if not perfectly centered. I think it a great price for a great stamp.
David
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I agree. I think that stamp is worth more than 25% of CV. Perhaps as much as 50% with the centering and thin. Great find!
Lars
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09:27:35pm
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That was a great price for that stamp. It's going to be hard to find a copy like that without a thin. It even has great perfs!
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This was selling for $30 at the last club meeting. Not my typical purchase, but something about it appealed to me so I brought it home.
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04:17:41pm
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That's cheap! Handsome stamp. Cool!
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Some people look for souvineers when they travel...i look for stamps and covers ! Heres a plum i picked out of an antique dealers postacard box in London !!!
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Heres the waterboy on the picture side !!!
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Charlie was obviously on active service in Cairo in November 1915 - I expect the inverted message was due to youthful carelessness (I had to invert my laptop to read it!). I wonder whether he survived the Great War.
And finally, I wonder if we are looking at the house his mother lived in here:
http://www.primelocation.com/for-sale/details/32990838#XLjeokwelrgBYtpz.97
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They must have added the sun room later !
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05:09:03pm
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Dude, wait a sec.... is that link that guthrum posted the exact address to where that post card was mailed??? A. If it is wow! That he found it and B. What a sweet homestead! I'm moving to Halifax!
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A couple of clues:
1. No house number or name is mentioned, other than 'Upper Stubbins Triangle', either on the postcard from 1915 or in the estate agent's list a century later. This suggests that this was (and may remain) the only big house in the area.
2. It's clearly a house that would have been there in 1915. The sort of place a young army officer might have been brought up in, perhaps.
It's not conclusive evidence, I realise, but it's a possible!
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i will never make detective !
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I love Google Maps! I very often look up addresses on my 1903-8 era covers. Sometimes I'm rewarded with a street view of an 1850s house where I can imagine my cover being delivered to! Other times I find a view of tall commercial buildings where there must've been a neighborhood in my era, but long gone in the name of progress.
Very interesting none the less!
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Hi Philb , the family of Crawshaw lived at 2 Upper Stubbins, Triangle, Sowerby, Yorks. in the 1911 census, image below. However there was no Charlie/ Charles in the family. I have checked census and birth records back to 1864.
There was a Charlie born in 1900 but not sure yet where he fits in. Would he not have been a little young to be on foreign service in 1915?
There is a family tree on Ancestry and I have written the owner to ask if he can shed any light on this.
If needed could I have permission to send him a copy of the card?
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09:01:33pm
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Sheepshanks. Awesome work maybe he was dating one of their daughters lol
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Silence in the face of adversity is the father of complicity and collusion, the first cousins of conspiracy..
22 Apr 2015
09:29:26pm
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Rather than clutter this thread up any further, I have posted a detailed answer to the question asked above somewhere "... What are they ( Large gold UK Horizon Labels ) for ?..." that Chemo illustrated with a scan.
Go Here
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Sheepshanks..Permission Granted !
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Ok so the plot gets darker. There was a Charles Bottomley Crawshaw born 1899, died 1974,
who on marriage banns in 1931 gave his father as Walter Crawshaw.
In the 1911 census at 5 Upper Stubbins, Triangle, there is a Bottomley family of Philip aged 49, Annie (wife) aged 47 and Percy (son)aged 14. could they be connected? Could Alice be the mother of an illegitimate Charles, with Walter as father?
Without a birth certificate it is hard to be certain, hopefully the Ancestry tree owner will come up with an answer.
Stay tuned for the next exciting instalment.
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I think I shall be truly happy if, even for a little while, I can have 'Upper Stubbins' as an address.
But alas, I shall never reach those lofty heights. Lower Stubbins befits my station. Or perhaps Under Stubbins.
I love this thread.
Mark
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We know the father is Harry ("Mrs H.Crawshaw"), the mother is Julia. However, "mother" in the letter may be an honorary title - I don't think Charlie is Julia's son. Mabel was born a year after Harry and Julia married and they have no other children by 1911.
Walter could be Harry's brother, but that still leaves a 16-year old out in Cairo on active service. (I think illegitimacy is highly unlikely - you didn't keep illegitimate children in the family in those days - you sent them for adoption.) Does that really look like the handwriting of a 16-year-old?
It's an odd little message: "Have found a sweetheart for you, how do you think you'll like him."!
It'll remain a mystery unless we get more evidence...
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No answer from Ancestry yet but it is always possible that Charlie is the husband Harry, maybe a second christian or pet name for him. A lot of Northern folk referred to the wife as "mother" and I believe still do to this day.
As far as I have researched there is not a Walter in Harry's immediate family but they could be cousins and are no doubt related somewhere along the line.
Vic
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Here is a real "KILLER" of a cancel. Any ideas where they used this mean machine?
Mike
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doubt it's a machine; more likely a cork cancel
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ALEXANDRETTA...I finally finished it!
The last series of 5 stamps on page 1, fairly hard to find, commemorate the death of Ataturk.
Fascinating history for the region, (and now so much in the news as of late). Here is some brief history
""From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia (edited)
The Sanjak of Alexandretta (Turkish: İskenderun Sancağı, French: Sandjak d'Alexandrette, Arabic: سنجق الإسكندرونة‎ Sanjaq al-Iskandarūna) was a Mandate of Syria composed of Alexandretta and Antioch, present day İskenderun and Antakya, and became autonomous under Article 7 of the French-Turkish treaty of October 20, 1921: "A special administrative regime shall be established for the district of Alexandretta. The Turkish inhabitants of this district shall enjoy facility for their cultural development. The Turkish language shall have official recognition". This was due to the presence of an important Turkish community along with Arabs of various religious denominations.
In 1923 Alexandretta was attached to the State of Aleppo, and in 1925 it was directly attached to the French mandate of Syria, still with special administrative status.
Map showing the states of the French mandate states
French Mandate
Of Philatelic Interest are the stamps of Alaouites, Alexandretta, Hatay, Latakia, Rouad, Syria and Lebanon, all issued during the French Mandate of post WW1 Ottoman empire breakout territories.
The 1936 elections in the sanjak returned two MPs favoring the independence of Syria from France, and this prompted communal riots as well as passionate articles in the Turkish and Syrian press. The sanjak was given autonomy in November 1937 in an arrangement brokered by the League. Under its new statute, the sanjak became 'distinct but not separated' from the French Mandate of Syria on the diplomatic level, linked to both France and Turkey for defence matters.
1938 voter registration and "elections"
Turkish forces entered Ä°skenderun on July 5, 1938.
The allocation of seats in the sanjak assembly was based on the 1938 census held by the French authorities under international supervision: out of 40 seats, 22 were given to the Turks, nine for Alawi Arabs, five for Armenians, two for Sunni Arabs, and two for Christian Arabs. This repartition was the result of a Turkish military intervention from Payas and Hassa just beforehand, on July 5, 1938, with the ethnic cleansing of most of its Arab and Armenian inhabitants who constituted the majority of the population. Turkey had also crossed tens of thousands of Turks into the Sanjak of Alexandretta. These were Turks born in Hatay who were now living elsewhere in Turkey. In two government communiqués in 1937 and 1938, the Turkish government asked all local government authorities to make lists of their employees originally from Hatay. Those who listed were then sent to Hatay to register as citizens and vote. Moreover, the results seemed to be questionable because it happened for the sole purpose of seat repartition. (note...padding the ballot, still done in my old town of Chicago lol)
On September 2, 1938, the assembly proclaimed the Sanjak of Alexandretta as the Hatay State. The State lasted for one year under joint French and Turkish military supervision. The name "Hatay" itself was proposed by Atatürk and the government was under Turkish control.
The Hatay State became the Hatay Province of Turkey in 1939.
My philatelic goal for this year is to complete the collections of all the French Mandate States of the former Ottoman Empire!
rrr....
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12:59:39pm
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Fantastic RRR! So the only thing that designates these as coming from Alexandretta is the overprint? Are false overprints ever an issue with these?
-Ernie
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Ernie...I really don't know how bad it is...but the need to be careful with ALL overprints applies, especially those coming from this part of the world.
We should ask our resident expert, Nelson. As far as the stamps I scanned, I am pretty sure (given their origin, many were from correspondence from my Grandfather who worked there for a while) that they are authentic. I cannot vouch for the last few Ataturk Death o/p I acquired recently. I know that Rouad has a problem especially for Rouad #1-3...so my guess is that if it has a high philatelic value, you should be very careful. Their usage was limited, so there are no fakes used to cheat the post office...just collectors like you and me.
Would love to hear what Nelson has to say. rrr...
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04:54:52pm
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"Expert" - just an interested observer!
I honestly have not spent much effort on these so this is a casual observation.
Are they being faked? - do they have overprints - then absolutely!
Given the very short time these were issued and where they come from, they are prime targets.
From this far away vantage
The 10-11-1938 ovpt. on yours look good. The 9, 3 and 1 appear to vary so it would be good to get a genuine block to compare variations.
This group has a lot of variation in the overprints that show up.
In this group I believe the key is the shape of the 2 t's and the x which are distinct.
The crooks will probably mess up that first S also.
In this group the D'ALEX is larger.
I had not looked for forgeries but as I was writing this I had a quick look & found this one on the right immediately, on a "decent" auction site. eBay has MANY of this series for sale - too many!
Overall, yours look fine
The last group I did not check
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Michael...good memory!
The Scott #17 was the last holdout. Finally got it, in what looked like authentic not counterfeit condition, and at a decent price.
You are right..there are a few more, I will post a scan for those who are interested.
(o/p out of focus due to cheap scanner...the stamps are better)
That is all of Alexandretta!
rrr...
And for the cancellation specialist:
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Nelson...you are right...way too many offered on ebay.
Some look particularly doubtful...here are 2 where the 10-11-1938 in particular, was probably added to a real Alexandretta stamp. The second one does not look like it is Mint either.
For those interested, see if you can spot the warning signs (currently on ebay):
compare these with a good one (I am pretty sure) from my collection:
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07:53:37pm
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Rrr, is it that the 10-11-1938 is much darker???
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Ernie, no, I enhanced the photo to sharpen a picture that needed help, focussing just on the o/p shape. Reposting straight out of the camera, so please excuse the out-of focus aspect:
rrr....
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