Who Invented The First Adhesive Postage Stamp

I have been doing some reading about the Penny Black, first issued in England in 1840 and was wondering who else knew who the inventor was.

I bought a book about this gentleman at the recent stamp show I went to. I wanted to regail you all with amazing facts and history from it, but it is "temporarily misplaced" in my stamp mess room.

History tells us and the general belief has been that Sir Rowland Hill was the originator of the adhesive postage stamp, first used in England in 1840.

There are several documents, books, concerning this issue. It appears that Mr. James Chalmers may indeed, be the actual originator. In the latter part of the 19th century there was a lot of contention concerning this issue brought forward by the son of James Chalmers and thus refuted by the son of Rowland Hill.

The reading is fun, interesting and informative. After reading the documents I tend to believe that it was James Chalmers who actually did the work but Rowland Hill, because of his position, took the credit for it and the money and the merit. History had thus been written and Hill got the credit.

References & Suggested Reading;
The Adhesive Postage Stamp by Patrick Chalmers, 1887
The Origin of Postage Stamps by Pearson Hill, 1888
How James Chalmers Saved the Penny Postage Scheme, James & Patrick Chalmers, 1890

Remember, history is nearly always written by the victors.

It would be interesting to hear what others on the forum think about this matter. It happened 170 years ago and we are the collectors of their imaginations, one of them anyway, but which one?.

OK Art
one back at you. who invented the post mark?
Ron

Henry Bishop

I thought I was doing pretty good finding about James Chalmers! The postmark! Now I have to find out about Henry Bishop, thank you very much stallzer!

Well then.....
go no further than SCF compendium of knowledge....

https://goscf.com/t/12361

Aside from needing a hair cut...



He was still one uguly dude!
This was his post mark that he created.

I think I may have posted this elsewhere on the forum ,but, heres a Centenary cover of the Inventor of the adhesive stamp, a fellow Dundonian ... James Chalmers ....

I have come across an interesting article about both gentlemen:

http://www.stampdomain.com/stamp_in...on/index.htm

In this article it's stated that:

"It is clear that James Chalmers was aware of Rowland Hill's proposals, but it appears that he had not obtained a copy of Hill's booklet but just read about it in the Times. The Times had, on two occasions, on 25 March 1837 and on 20 December 1837 reported in great detail Hill's proposals. In neither report was there any mention of "a bit of paper just large enough to bear the stamp". So having only read the edited version of the proposals in the Times he would have been completely unaware that Hill had already made the proposal for "a bit of paper…"

So, I still believe that Sir Rowland Hill is the one who invented the first postage stamp.

Cheers

Lovrenc Košir

according to this website, Kosir's recommendation for a postage stamp beat Rowland Hill by at least a year.

http://www.stampdomain.com/stamp_in...on/index.htm

Kuhli, yes it is true. But according to this website as well, they say that Prof. Ernst Bernardini who said in his book that:

Košir stated that he met Galway "about a year after the rejection of my project" which would make it mid 1837.

This clearly means that Lovrenc Košir and Rowland Hill both independently invented the stamp, not as many writers have suggested in the past. Lovrenc Košir's proposal was rejected whereas Rowland Hill had numerous supporters to his proposal and with their help he succeeded to have his proposal accepted.

[Prof. Ernst Bernardini spent many years researching the subject. His research included examining many original archive documents in Vienna, Ljubljana, Zagreb, Budapest and Bern. He shows that Košir did in fact make a proposal in a letter dated 31 December 1835. His research also shows that Košir met an Englishman, Galway, in mid 1837. This was after Rowland Hill had published his proposal.]

Cheers

James Chalmers headstone ...

I like the epitaph on the headstone. morbid but interesting.

By 1982 James Chalmers had been downgraded to "maker" and not inventor. There was a nasty exchange of views by the respective sons of Chalmers and Hill which went on for many years. Both claimed their father to be the first. Hill's task was finding a method of postage that would work. A lot of people put forward ideas and there was several competitions to find that method. Hill certainly implemented the postage system but I doubt he "invented" stamps. Many people in UK and Europe had ideas broadly similar. Even being a Scot does not make me claim Chalmers to be the inventor... OK we did invent most things (fax machine in 1843 for instance) TV, telephone... Glenlivet whisky

"Henry Bishop introduced the world's first known postmark that takes his name in 1661.The "Bishop Mark" was designed to show the date on which a letter was received by the post and to ensure that the dispatch of letters would not be delayed. These were the world's first handstruck postage stamps"