Show Your US 1861 Perforated Stamps

re: Port Royal.
Here are two images borrowed from HipStamp The first is the non-duplexed version from 1862, and the second icover with the duplexed killer from 1864. Note the P and L are visible on your stamp at the same angle to each other, as well as the general spacing/punctuation of the "S.C" at the bottom. Note the slender shape of the "S.C" on yours and the 1862 cover below.

John:

Wow! You're right. That cancel does line up with what I have. Sure wish so many of my stamps were still on cover. Kind of a shame they're not.

Thank you for noticing that! Port Royal. I know of the place, but I'm from the Summerville/Charleston area and didn't get to Hilton Head much.

Now I'm in Fla, but need to move to a better place :-}

Very nice to learn this.

Best,

Josh

Here's a nice imperf from the era - 66a Lake. I know the topic is "perforated" - but thought it might be ok.

(it has PF cert)

I could use a little help identifying this stamp on the cover - best I can tell it is a 85, 88 or 94. Pencil written is from whom I purchased I dentifying as a 94. The grille is not completely clear. Any other options to check?

Looks like E grill, but really hard to see what's going on behind his head.

NicholasC yes that is my interpretation when I measure as well. After measuirng again I am ruling out 85 as the height of the grille is clearly 13mm no more.

Looks like 11 (certainly no more than 12) vertical rows and 16 or 17 horizontal rows. My vote is F grill, Scott #94.

I definitely see 12 vertical, maybe the lattice work is causing it to look like additional vertical. Without real in hand inspection or no other proof, might have to say F grill.

Ray.mac- Your 3c collection is phenomenal. I would love to have a poster of your entire 3c collection to use as a personal reference (and to motivate me to do better!)

If you don't mind, could you take a shot at the color and possible year of this one?



I believe it's a dull claret based on the color of the one you've shown, but also by the similar sharp design and neat perforations (although I believe mine is reperfered on right), and has a fluorescent nature to it. Very bright when put next to other 65s.

Also, does this stamp have what is called a 'cameo effect' going on? I saw a similar occurrence on some GB SG8s from a separate thread where a particular ink would 'stain' the paper blue. It would be visible mostly from the reverse, but also faintly around the design elements in the front much like the 65 here. They called it "cameo", but I would like to know more about that and what causes it.

Sorry, I'm not familiar with the cameo effect, and I haven't seen this, or don't remember seeing this in any of the 3c 1861 references I've seen.

And for color, I wouldn't be able to give an opinion from an image from the Internet. It certainly could be in the claret/rose claret family, but you really need year-dated examples either on or off cover. It's frustrating, and I have hundreds of 3c 1861's that I can't ID either because of either not having a year date on the cover or loose stamps not on cover.

Thanks and sorry, Ray

A little off topic for a US thread, but since you asked, briefly, no, US stamps don't exhibit the same Cameo or Ivory Head phenomenon as the early GB stamps.

From Linn's, here is an excerpt of the interesting story how these came about.
https://www.linns.com/news/us-stamp...lations.html

Rowland Hill, "inventor of the postage stamp", was concerned about people removing cancellations and re-using stamps. While a red Maltese Cross cancel on the Penny Black is very pretty, it was sometimes hard to see the cancellation, so they soon switched to red stamps and black cancels. Hill was concerned about the cancellations being removed by various chemicals so he added extra measures to the papers and inks to help combat this.

Many experiments involved a chemical then called prussiate of potash, now called potassium ferrocyanide.

This chemical would make the red ink of the stamp more fugitive, that is, destroyed by any substance that might be used to remove the cancel.

A side effect, however, was that when prussiate of potash combined with water (as it would be when the paper was dampened for printing), it would turn the paper blue.

Prussiate of potash was tested in three different ways: incorporation into the paper, incorporation into the red printing ink, and dipping the printed stamp into a solution of the chemical.

Eventually, some prussiate of potash was incorporated into the ink used to print the Penny Red. Some stamps have so much of this chemical that the paper has turned blue in the areas where the red ink is heavily applied but remains white where the red ink is light, primarily the queen's portrait.

These stamps are called "ivory heads" because the portrait area appears as an ivory color when the back of the stamp is viewed.

This bluing was eliminated in 1857 by a change in the formula of the ink.

Here are a couple of examples from another SCF thread
https://goscf.com/t/69294

That information is extremely helpful, Zebraman! It's always nice to hear answers based around the known science. I don't suppose we know the exact chemicals and testing processes used on the 1861 3c, do we? I think the number of trial pieces is quite extensive...

It was great timing, but Chipg said in a recent thread:
"Pink was used early in the production cycle. It was determined to be too fugitive, so later printings shifted to more rose (darker) shades. Simple test - it a cover dates from mid-1862 or later, it's not pink. Even early 1862 is likely not pink.

The so-called "Pigeon Blood Pink" is a pink shade with a slightly bluish cast. If exposed to light, it was become "Pink." There are many examples of previously certified pigeon bloods that got re-certified as pink or rose pink due to fading."

That makes me think of 2 points concerning this one.
1) Since many colors came out of trial periods for this issue, and the pink was deemed to be "too fugitive", I wonder if mine doesn't have a similar highly-fugitive ink that caused the reverse to resemble something like what the Prussia of potash pieces exhibit.

2) Chipg said that the pidgeon blood changes color depending on the light. Actually mine does the same thing, but because it only looked pink under certain light just assumed it was the light playing tricks.
Here is a picture against a different light source.



It probably wouldn't be expertized as anything like a trial piece if I were to submit it, but it's an interesting thing to look at.

Looks like a regular 65 to me.

A few from the "I will never know the real shade" group of 7X's.........

Over the years I've read everything I could find on the color/shades of the 3c 1861. Again, I've never seen in writing, anywhere describing the pink shade as being "fugitive". My understanding is that it simply wasn't a stable color and faded too easily.

A method I can use to identify 64-something-- a great student of this stamp, Jack Daley, taught me his method of scanning the area with the highest concentration of color (the small, darker area just under the "3" in either upper corner) at 4800-9600 dps, and then enhancing the result with Photoshop Elements. This method brings out the individual pixels and there are a multitude of different shades in each stamp. The area between the red/pink/purple/magenta pixels is much different for a 64-something than a 65. The wash that is in between the pixels on a 65 is yellow, and that makes sense-- the small amounts of yellow in the wash makes the stamp not pink. So it was the addition of the yellow wash to stabilize the color of the stamp.

On a 64-something, the pixels are more purple/magenta/pink, and the wash in between the pixels is white.

Good example here of a 64b. I had to use the "U" in U.S. because of a cancel being in the way, but in the darker area under the "U", you'll see a lot of white in between the pixels.


Here is a salmon rose. Salmon is often mistaken for pink. I have a salmon golf shirt and someone accused me of wearing pink! You'll see some white under the "3", but there are also lots of little yellow pixels also:



On the 65's, I've never been able to use this method to determine the different shades, but Jack Daley was able to. I'm not versed well on what combinations of hues make up the different colors that can show up on a 65. I can look and know if it has "lake" in the stamp, because it shows dark violet pixels. This one is lake rose:



Also, absolutely agree that the stamp posted by Solomon's Prayer is definitely not 64-something and is 65.

Hope this has been helpful-- Ray