Australia Commonwealth Curious Postmark

Hello


I don't have any knowledge about australian postmark, so I interpret the cancellations on the envelope as date postmarks. I don't know what the 5-P prefix means but then I read 12 November 59 on the left stamp and 11 November 59 on the right stamp.
Curious, how to explain it?

5-P is likely a time, but someone familiar with these will know.

Nice catch. However, if you look at the right where the cancellation is supposed to tie the 5d stamp to the cover you may notice the curvature of the cancellation on the stamp and on the cover do not align.

Congratulations on your observation, you're right, it's a trick envelope.
But I don't understand the procedure.
The November 12 postmark is original. But where does that of November 11 come from? And has the SG274 been added as well?
8d was it a possible postage in 1959? Was November a public holiday in Australia?

Hi Antoin,

5d was the rate for a standard letter up to 1 oz in 1959 - from 1 October. The second weight step would account for the extra 3d. (3d for each additional weight step above 1 oz).

Thus the combination looks to be as it should be for a letter weighing more than 1 oz and less than 2 ozs.

The "P" stands for PM. After 12 noon.

Aberdeen is a sleepy little place up in the country. The postmaster generally doesn't wake up until the first bang of the CDS on a letter. That's what happened here I'd bet. He then looked at the cancel and realized he'd not changed the date. He then did so and Hey Presto! - a philatelic abberation for the discernable collector.

The canceller looks like it was re-inked between strikes.

Black Swan has the most likely explanation I'd say. The PM probably didn't adjust the time from the previous day.

How about:

A heavy letter (second weight step) was posted 11th November with just the 5d stamp.

The postmaster cancelled it, then realised the letter was overweight. He/she held it. The sender returned the following day and paid for the additional 3d-worth of stamps, which were duly affixed and cancelled.

Note that the SE corner of the 2d stamp would be expected to have some trace of the 11 November postmark if it had been on the envelope at that point.

Phil

As I already remarked, the arc of the 5d cancellation does not line up with the 11 November cancellation on the cover. Not only does that cancel miss the 2d stamp, it does not tie the 5d stamp to the cover either.

NSK, we will have to agree to differ on that observation. To my eyes, the 5d stamp appears tied by the 9 of 59 as well as by the arc of the cds. Kind regards, Phil

Yes, we have. The arc on the 5d will fall inside the one on the cover. The '9' of '59' is only on the perforation tips of the stamp, not on the cover.

The postmarks overlaid, showing precisely the same canceller including the 'break' over the D in Aberdeen. The part of the postmark on the Christmas stamp matches perfectly with corresponding parts on the Queen stamps postmark, including the partial 9 of 59 and arc location, so the tie to cover is good.

Note that the transparency changes sequentially such that the first image has none of the 12 NOV postmark visible and the last image has (almost) none of the 11 NOV postmark visible.

I do not think that either of the postmarks are perfectly round.

By adding a new layer to the image and then placing a perfectly round semi-transparent blue circle in that layer, we can then move the circle over both postmarks. There is a slight budge or oval-ness to the cancels as seen here (accounting for the heaviness of the inking).


But in my opinion they are the same canceller with a re-ink between strikes. The time span between the two strikes will probably remain unknown.
Don

Is the bulge in the same spot and even the same size?

Given the variance of the inking thickness I do think they are the same size. And if the budge is in the 'same spot' does not matter (I wasn't going to spend time rotating the cancels) because I was checking for roundness. The roundness is the same no matter the orientation.
Don

My theory would be. A trainee employee given the job of cancelling the stamps missed the other two. The postmaster checked his/her work and could not stand the thought of uncancelled stamps leaving his post office and fixed it.