When Letters Rerouted By Dead Letter Office Does Anyone Know Procedures They Followed

Attached are 2 envelopes rerouted by the dead letter office in Wash DC. It appears they blacked out the return address on the envelope and then forwarded to initial addressee? Does anybody know anything about these items. Also other markings on envelopes? Thanks

You are over-analyzing these two envelopes. The short answer is "recycling".

These are 3 cent envelopes ordered during WWI with a preprinted return address of the firm which ordered them. When the rate went back to 2 cents, the firm redeemed the envelopes. The USPOD then decided to use them rather than destroying them. Thus the black-out of the original return address and the addition of a their return address and the penalty clause over the 3 cent embossing. The dead letter used them as normal "new" envelopes to pass through the mail once, containing whatever they were returning or forwarding. So the blacked-out address would have nothing to do with the contents sent out by the DLO.

Never would have come up with that. Thanks for the info.

There were fees for the actions undertaken by the Dead Letter Office which was collected as "postage due" when returned to the sender. Your two examples were for the 3 cent type action, an action as explained on one envelope.

Some information and a catalog listing of your penalty overprinted covers is available in the UPSS catalog by Galloway and Derrick Penalty Overprinted Stamped Envelopes, Wrappers and Postal Cards of the United States and Possessions available for purchase at http://upss.org/code/publications.php or at your favorite philatelic library.

thanks.