Part 4 (1/2)
To facilitate the prepayment of letters pa.s.sing from Canada to England by the Canadian steamers, a new stamp bearing value of 6 pence sterling, or 7-1/2 pence currency, being the Canadian Packet rate, has been secured and put in circulation.
A new stamp has also been introduced of the value of one halfpenny to serve as the medium for prepaying transient Newspapers.
Moreover, the Department has been led, by the increasing use of Postage Stamps, to take measures for obtaining the Canadian Postage Stamps in sheets perforated in the dividing lines, in the manner adopted in England, to facilitate the separation of a single stamp from the others on a sheet when required for use.
It will thus be seen that the 7-1/2d value, which was recommended three years earlier (at the time the 10d was issued), materialised at last, though there appears to be no official record bearing on the date the new value was placed on sale to the public. The volume dealing with the postage stamps of British North America, published by the Royal Philatelic Society some twenty years ago, gives the date of issue as June 2nd, 1857, though no authority for this statement is given.
[Ill.u.s.tration]
The design was adapted from that of the discarded 12d of 1851, the same portrait of Queen Victoria adorning the central oval. The inscribed band around this contains the words CANADA PACKET POSTAGE at the top, and SIX PENCE STERLING at the bottom, the two inscriptions occupying so much s.p.a.ce that there was no room for dividing ornaments of any kind. In the upper and lower left hand corners is ”6d stg.” and in the right hand corners ”7-1/2d cy.” is shown. A word of explanation regarding the use of the word PACKET in the inscription is necessary. This does not refer to any parcel post (indeed, there was no parcel post at that period) as has sometimes been erroneously a.s.serted, but refers to the fast mail steamers of the day which were then known as ”packets”. This denomination, as shown by the extract from the Postmaster-General's report printed above, was intended for use on single letters sent to England via the Canadian packets.
This 7-1/2d stamp was, according to Mr. Howes, printed in sheets of 120 arranged in ten horizontal rows of twelve each, each sheet showing the imprint of the manufacturers eight times on the margins as in the case of the values issued previous to 1857. Only one consignment, consisting of 834 sheets (100,800 stamps) was received, and as 17,670 of these were still on hand when the decimal currency was introduced in 1859, a simple calculation will show that the total quant.i.ty issued was 82,410 stamps.
Although there had been a real need for a halfpenny value since the first adhesives made their appearance in Canada--as shown by several rates it was impossible to prepay in stamps without them--it was not until 1857 that a stamp of this denomination was placed in use. The following circular announced their impending issue:--
POSTAGE ON NEWSPAPERS AND PERIODICALS.
POST OFFICE DEPARTMENT.
TORONTO. _18th July, 1857._
Under the Post Office Law of last Session taking effect from 1st August, 1857, Newspapers printed and published in Canada, and mailed direct from Office of Publication, will pa.s.s free of Canadian Postage.
Periodicals so printed, published, and mailed when specially devoted to Religious and to General Education, to Agriculture, or Temperance, or to any branch of Science, will pa.s.s free from any one Post-Office to another within the Province.
Transient and re-mailed Papers and Periodicals will pa.s.s by Post if prepaid by Postage stamp--one halfpenny if not exceeding 3 oz. in weight, and 2d if over 3 oz.
Postage Stamps of the value of one halfpenny each will be sold to the public at all the princ.i.p.al Post Offices (including all Money Order Offices), with a discount of 5 per cent. upon purchases of not less than twenty stamps and will be available in prepayment of Newspapers and Periodicals, and of Drop and Town Letters.
R. SPENCE, Postmaster-General.
The Royal Philatelic Society's book gives the date of the above notice--July 18th, 1857--as the date of issue of the new stamp but, as Mr. Howes observes ”it is more likely that the stamp was issued on 1st August, the day the new rates took effect.”
Although this stamp is generally conceded to be the last of the ”pence”
values to be issued, until more definite information regarding the date of issue of the 7-1/2d can be procured, this supposition can rest on no more substantial basis than that of mere conjecture.
[Ill.u.s.tration]
The design is quite unlike that of any of the other values expressed in pence and consists of the conventional profile portrait of the Queen shown on so many of the stamps of the British Empire, within an oval band inscribed CANADA POSTAGE, at the top, and ONE HALF PENNY, at the bottom. There are no numerals or inscriptions in the corners but merely a plain pattern of diagonally crossed lines. Mr. Howes states ”the stamp was printed in sheets of 100, ten rows of ten, with the right marginal imprints as described for the series of 1851.”
From the Postmaster-General's report we gather that 1,341,600 halfpenny stamps were received prior to October 1st, 1857, though whether these were all in one consignment or not is not quite clear. At any rate judging from the statement in the same report that ”the Department has been led to take measures for obtaining ... sheets perforated” it would appear that the above quant.i.ty comprised all the imperforate stamps of this denomination. On the other hand the total number of halfpenny stamps issued was 3,389,960 and catalogue quotations for the imperforate and the perforated varieties hardly bear out the supposition that only the first lot were issued without perforation.
While the 10d value is found on several sorts of paper no such extreme variation is provided as in the case of the stamps of 1851. The 7-1/2d and 1/2d values, printed at a later date, provide still fewer varieties, which would seem to indicate that as time progressed the manufacturers exercised a nicer discrimination in their choice of paper. Most of the stamps seem to have been printed on a hard wove paper, varying a little in thickness; the 10d is found on a very thin paper; and the 1/2d is recorded on ribbed paper, though whether this is a true ”ribbed” variety or merely the result of some peculiarity in printing is open to discussion. As the ribbed lines are anything but distinct, though the paper showing this peculiarity is a little softer than that generally used, it is more than likely that the ribbing was purely accidental.
Owing to the differing qualities of paper used the same idiosyncrasies of measurement in the size of the designs may be noted, especially in the case of the 10d as was referred to in a previous chapter. But as all variations of this character in stamps printed from line-engraved plates were long ago conclusively proved to be due to nothing more exciting than paper shrinkage it is hardly worth while wearying our readers with a resurrection of all that has been written on the subject leading up to the proof. While examples showing the extremes of size are of interest in a specialised collection little can be said in favor of their philatelic value.
_Reference List._
1855-57. Engraved and printed by Rawdon, Wright, Hatch & Edson, New York, on wove paper. Imperforate.