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Chapter 17. Cancellations

Reposing under the glass top of a stamp dealer's counter was a "cover" bearing an ordinary three-cent stamp issued by the United States in 1869. Almost every collector will at once know the stamp we are talking about it is ultramarine in color and bears a picture of an old time locomotive.

Such a stamp in itself is not valuable. One may be purchased in used condition for as little as fifty cents perhaps even less.

This particular stamp was unusual because it had been canceled by a picture of a running chicken. Such fancy cancellations were made by postal clerks who had time on their hands to fashion on the ends of bottle corks various designs with which to cancel the mail passing through their hands. Collectors greatly prize these fancy cancellations, and the cover in the dealer's counter was priced at $10.00 a high price without doubt and the cover remained under the counter for many months before anyone would buy it. Eventually it was sold to someone who really wanted it. A few years later this very same cover was put up at auction and fetched an amazing price-over one thousand dollars!

"Running chicken.".

A most unusual case, to be sure, but one that points up the importance of cancellations that appear on stamps.

Let's look them over and see what it is all about.

To begin with, there are usually two marks placed on a letter by the Post Office Department: the postmark, which identifies the town of origin, the day of the month, the year, and even the time of mailing; and, the cancellation, which is the device that renders the stamp attached to the envelope of no further franking value.

Modern postmarks and cancellations look like this

Modern cancellation.

From the beginning of the use of postage stamps in this country in 1847 and for sometime before the "stampless cover" period the postmark portion of the canceling device has been almost always of circular shape. Sometimes the postmark and the canceling device were ganged together in one instrument. Sometimes they were two separate instruments. Sometimes, for convenience, postal clerks would bind the two instruments together. In any event the general idea has been that the postmark should fall somewhere on the envelope so as to be readable. Often the clerks would make the postmark perform the double duty of canceling the stamp and serving as a postmark. Often early nineteenth century postmarks contained only the name of the town and the abbreviation for the State. And, as we have seen, some postmasters cut fancy designs upon corks to "kill" the stamps. Such devices, whether of specific design or only the circular ends of the corks, are called "killers". Only fancy-shaped killers are prized by collectors.

Odd cancellations.

Early United States stamps bearing postmarks often called "town" cancellations-with year dates are scarce and much sought after. In fact, any unusual cancellation on a stamp is a collectable item.

In addition to the postmark and the killer the Post Office often used other marks upon stamps and letters, which are of interest to collectors. The stamps on all foreign addressed mail that passed through the New York Post Office from 1871 to 1877 were canceled with a killer in the shape of fancy stars and designed usually in a circle. There are about one hundred different types of these New York foreign mail killers and all are eagerly sought after.

New York foreign mail cancellations.

Still other markings have been applied to stamps or letters to indicate special handling by the Post Office Department. Thus a small rectangle inclosing the words "Supplementary Mail" or the same words with a circular "town" postmark indicated that an extra fee had been paid by the sender to get the letter aboard an outgoing ship after the regular mail had closed. Letters carried on the Mississippi River packet boats often were canceled with the name of the steamer or perhaps merely "WAY" indicating the letter had been picked up along the way-or "SHIP" or "STEAM". Letters carried by stagecoaches carry cancellations of the "Central Overland, California & Pike's Peak Express" and others. "Pony Express" cancellations often feature a running pony and sometimes private carriers would apply markings, one of the most famous of the latter being the "Noisy Carrier" of San Francisco.

Steamboat postmarks. Pony express.

One of the many Mulready caricatures.

Other stamps have been killed with the letters "N", "S", "E" or "W", indicating to the postal clerks in which direction the letter was to travel.

All of these things contribute to the interest and value of stamps and letters. Indeed, no stamp should ever be removed from its original letter where anything in the way of a cancellation or postmark occurs either upon the stamp or the envelope itself. Some stamps are more valuable "on cover", that is, attached to the letters on which they were mailed. This is especially true of some of the higher denomination stamps of the nineteenth century. But the cover collector will demand that the stamp be "tied", that is, that the postmark or cancellation must cover part of the envelope and part of the stamp, both under the same mark, thus "tieing" the stamp to the cover.

Among our modern stamps, which are mostly canceled by machines, it is very unusual to find the postmark itself upon the stamp because the machine is set up so that the postmark will fall some distance to the left of where the stamp is usually placed. Hence collectors seek to obtain such postmarks, especially on commemorative stamps, by placing the stamp far to the left on the envelope. When this is done "just so" and the envelope is fed into the machine "just right", the postmark will fall exactly in the center of the stamp. Such cancellations are called by collectors "socked on the nose" and not a few philatelists make a specialty of such postmarks.

The subject of postmarks and cancellations is in itself a very broad field of collecting and research. In a very general way we have tried here merely to indicate just what to look for. Summed up, the whole idea may be wrapped up into a very few words: when looking for cancellations and postmarks it's the unusual that counts.

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