To Soak Or Not To Soak-Washington A140 2 Cent

I'm wondering if it is better to soak a cover if you think that the stamps could be valuable. Here is a cover I am trying to figure out what Scott number they are. The stamps are perf. 11 19 x 22 mm. I think I have narrowed it down to two numbers, #461 (hopefully) or #499. The #499 state in the book that the color is rose and these are definitely much darker. So I was leaning towards #499H. I really don't want to soak these because I think it's a great looking cover. Any ideas?

Don't soak, although not valuable it is paying special delivery rate. The stamps off cover are really of no value.

Edit: also is a nice inverted date slug, hard to fine nice covers from May 81

Ahh the cancel is mightier than the stamp again. Nice catch Russ , I was to busy looking at those red things to notice!

They look like booklet pane stamps, #499 came in booklets did #461?

Definitely Sc 499 booklet pairs. The cover is much nicer than the stamps. Please, don't soak. If you need some booklet pairs I'll give you some.

The 499 states it as a rose in color and these are actually darker than the scan I've posted. I guess that's what throws me off. Do the 499's have various color shades? Or could it be a 499h which states the color as lake?

There are various shades of the 499.

What do you mean by slug?

The duplex canceller had metal removable inserts with the month and numerals for date or time. These insets were commonly called slugs.



Here is the storage box with the slugs.

That's awesome! I almost bought one of those once but it went for waaaaay over what I would consider reasonable in just the last few minutes so, no cigar that time. That one seems to have a lot, if not all, of the accessories with it too! Nice.

Also, DO NOT SOAK that cover! I love it. I shows a special delivery rate and the booklet stamp usage example, albeit an extreme one!

Does anyone know what kind of value it has?

Unless there are some special marking on the back I would think about $2, perhaps up to $5 on a good day.