Here are some recent acquisitions of postal history destined for Africa. First off, this is my second cover to Cameroon, Africa. A first-class advertising envelope from Cincinnati, Ohio to Grand Batanga, Cameroon West Africa.
My next item is a picture postcard from Milwaukee, Wisconsin to a small village in German Southwest Africa (Ontjo). The postcard passed through the port town of Swakopmund where it received a transit postmark.
Finally, a lovely postcard from California to Mombasa, British East Africa (modern-day Kenya).
Here is a cool Caribbean destination postcard I recently found on eBay. Saba is a 13-square-kilometer island in the Lesser Antilles chain and was a part of the Dutch West Indies. The island is now a part of the Netherlands.
Here are four more international destinations added to the map. A couple of covers to the Austro-Hungarian Empire (Slovenia and Ukraine). A beautiful cover to Bluefields, Nicaragua, and a postcard to Liberia, Africa.
A popular category of philatelic study is disaster mail. Mail interrupted or damaged by a disaster such as a flood, fire, ship or plane wreck, war, etc. Below is an envelope recovered from the shipwreck of the S.S. Dakota, a passenger and cargo steamship that traveled the Pacific. The Dakota wrecked when she struck a reef off the coast of Japan near Yokohama on March 3, 1907. The ship was close enough to shore to avoid any deaths, and the passengers and cargo, including mail, were evacuated before she sunk.
Broadside of the S.S. Dakota.
Postcard of a photo about one hour after the accident.
Ninety-four shipwrecked passengers were transported to a nearby lighthouse and hamlets in a sparsely populated area. Two days later, the steamer Hakuai Maru arrived to carry the passengers and ten bags of mail to Yokohama. The surviving mail was severely water damaged. The cover shown below was sent from Montana to a U.S. Army Transport ship (USAT Logan) stationed in Nagasaki, Japan, and was franked with five 2¢ Washington stamps, as evident from the ghostly red stain on the right side. Feb 10, 1907, Missoula & Hamilton R.P.O postmark would have tied the ten cents of postage, paying twice the UPU letter rate for up to one ounce.
Hamilton, Montana, advertising cover damaged in the wreck of S.S. Dakota.
Mail aboard the wrecked ship was salvaged and subsequently delivered. A makeshift postal label in Japanese and English applied to the top of the cover, explaining, “Soaked and damaged in the wreck of Dakota. — Tokio (sic) Post Office”
Tokio Post Office manuscript label explaining the damage.
The damaged cover was also resealed with Japanese official seal stamps.
The reverse of the cover with Japanese official seals.
This is one of my favorite pieces in my collection. Please share any other info about the S.S. Dakota or other disaster covers or cards.
A postal treaty between the U.S. and Mexico was established in 1887. Similar to the postal agreement with Canada, mail was sent at the U.S. domestic rates instead of the international Univeral Postal Union (UPU) rates. The treaty remained in effect throughout the 2nd Bureau era of postage stamps. Shown below are a variety of uses to Mexico.
1st Class Mail
A postal treaty between the U.S. and Mexico provided mail services at a discounted rate. Four cents of postage paid twice the letter rate for up to two ounces for this cover sent from Michigan to Durango, Mexico.
First-class U.S. domestic letters were forwarded to Mexico at no additional charge due to the postal treaty.
Registered 1st Class Mail
A cover sent at the first-class 2¢ treaty rate with registry service (8¢) from Boulder, Colorado, to Mexico by way of the El Paso, Texas exchange office. A census maintained by the United States Stamp Society (USSS) lists 53 El Paso exchange labels recorded.
Twice the letter rate (4¢) for up to two ounces, plus an 8¢ fee for registry service on an advertising cover sent from Chicago to Mexico City. Handled in St Louis, Missouri, the cover received an exchange label before entering Mexico. There are 17 St Louis exchange labels recorded in the USSS census.
Postcard Rate
Instead of the UPU two-cents postcard rate, this card was sent for a penny due to the postal treaty.
I recently discovered a cover with the earliest documented use (EDU) of the 10-cents Webster stamp (Scott #307) on eBay. This is the second cover I found sent on March 7, 1903.
I previously found a remarkable registered cover to Hungary and had it certified by the American Philatelic Society (APS) as the new EDU, soundly besting the previous date by five days. Unfortunately, I had wrongly assumed the APS expertising department sent discoveries to the Scott Catalog editors. The wrong EDU date has remained in the catalog for the past eight years. The editors have now been contacted about both covers, and the earlier date should be reflected in the 2020 catalog.
Registered large envelope from Pittsburg, Pa. to Hungary by way of New York. Franked with a total of 48¢ paying the 8¢ registry fee plus eight times the UPU letter rate for less than four-ounces. The franking shows a mixed use of both 1st and 2nd Bureau stamps. Most 2nd Bureau stamp EDUs occur in early 1903.
The 10¢ Webster stamp paid the 8¢ registry fee plus 2¢ U.S./Canada treaty rate. The cover traveled from Springfield to Boston to Buffalo to Niagra Falls and finally St Catharines, Ontario in two days.
In 1885 the United States and Canada entered into a postal treaty that provided domestic rates for most types of mail. The treaty remained in effect throughout the 2nd Bureau era of postage stamps. Shown below are a variety of uses for Canada.
1st Class Mail
New York City Evening Post corner card advertising envelope sent at the first-class 2-cents treaty rate to Canada instead of the 5-cents international rate for saving 3-cents. The Washington stamp has the 1566 plate number selvage still attached.
Registered 1st Class Mail
The ten-cents Webster stamp paid the eight-cents registry fee plus the 2-cents letter rate. Registered mail between the U.S. and Canada did not require registry exchange labels.
Postcard Rate
1-cent postcard treaty rate. The Franklin stamp is punched with the Hamburg-American Line (HAL) perfin.
Postcards made from nonstandard material (e.g., metal, bark, wood) required first-class postage. The sender correctly franked this wooden postcard with a pair of one-cent stamps paying the domestic letter rate (the treaty rate) to Ontario, Canada.
3rd Class Mail Rate
The U.S./Canada 3rd class mail treaty rate was equivalent to the domestic rate of 1-cent per two ounces.
4th Class Mail (Samples or Merchandise)
Six cents of postage tied by a dateless postmark (typical of 3rd and 4th class mail). The envelope was sent via the domestic 4th class rate of one cent per ounce for up to six ounces.
Registered 4th Class Mail
Parcel wrapper franked with 20 cents of postage. Eight-cents registry fee plus 12 times the 4th class rate of one cent per ounce. A duty-free handstamp was applied when processed in Canada.
Unusual and distant international destinations were what initially piqued my interest in postal history. Below is a fantastic registered cover to one of Europe’s smallest countries landlocked between Austria and Switzerland, Liechtenstein declared its sovereignty in 1806. This envelope was sent in 1903 from Kilbourn, Wisconsin to Vaduz, Switzerland. Why the sender wrote Switzerland rather than Liechtenstein is unknown to me. Vaduz is the capital of Liechtenstein and has a population of only 5450 in 2017.
1903 registered letter to Vaduz, Liechtenstein. Five cents letter rate + eight cents registry fee.
I’ve been organizing my international destination binders/albums and have rediscovered a few items that I had long since filed away. Below are a postcard and a cover to the British colonies of Belize and Fiji. I also have a pair of covers to separate colonial cities on the island of Borneo. Click on an image to open the destinations map webpage.
1905 postcard sent from Chicago to Belize (Britsh Honduras) via New Orleans; it only took 12 days for this card to make its way to the tiny British colony.
1908 2-cents postal stationery with additional 3-cents stamp sent from Soldiers Home, California to Suva, Fiji.
Advertising cover from 1903 sent to Bandjermasin, Borneo, Dutch East India (modern-day Indonesia). Sent from Quincy, Ill and placed aboard the Chicago-Kanas City Rail (R.P.O.) by mistake and marked ‘MISSENT.’ The cover eventually made its way to New York where it traveled by sea to Borneo arriving about a month later.
Cover posted from the territory of Hawaii to Sandakan, British North Borneo (modern-day Malaysia). The cover traveled through Hong Kong (backstamp) on its six-week journey.
I picked up a few new international destinations and have added them to the world map. If the map does not load for you, please send me a message including details on which platform and browser you are using.
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