Worldwide Postage Due Scans

Yes. No real change at the period we're talking about, and I guess the sharp decline in the early 20s would have been mirrored in the world economy generally. So the real problem for the French was during and immediately after WW1.

I guess that since the only French things I collect are pre-WW1 pneumatiques, I still had that rosy view of the Franc from the days when 90 centimes would get you a champagne night out at the Follies and enough change for fish and chips at the Restaurant Anglais on the way home.

I hadn't been conscious of how much damage was done to the economy subsequently. But as I said earlier in the post: that's the delight of studying Postage Dues - you learn Stuff!

(That's what went wrong over here: Gordon Brown had an Economics degree, but he didn't collect stamps! )

Welcome back to my faithful reader(s?).
As for the rest of you - stop crouching behind the sofa pretending you're out!

After last week's controversies we'll have something a little quieter this week: Yugoslavian Postage Dues On Holiday In Other Countries!

In 1918 the Austrian army, having occupied parts of North Italy, insisted on the use of Austrian stamps. However, since the Lira was 6 centesimi off par with the Krone a straightforward sale of Austrian stamps at face value in Italian prices would have meant that the occupied Italians were getting their post cheaper than Austrians 'back home'. So they surcharged the stamps with as near as they could get to the heller value + 6% (rounded up!). For some reason (presumably availability) they used Bosnian postage dues and express stamps, rather than normal Austrian; Bosnia of course was at this time under Austrian occupation.
Philatelic cover showing the full issue of surcharged postage dues:




At the end of WW1 a quantity of earlier Bosnian postage dues turned up in the Ukrainian town of Stanislavov, presumably taken by the Austrian military in case it was necessary to do the same there as in North Italy. They fell into the hands of the shortlived Republic of Western Ukraine who overprinted them and used them as postals.

Left hand one is genuine; right hand one has a faked overprint, very common at the moment:


Pre WW2 Yugoslavian postage dues used as dues in wartime NDH (Croatia):



Pre WW2 Yugoslavian postage dues used as postals in wartime NDH:



Pre WW2 Yugoslavian postage due used as due in Italian occupied Montenegro:


Pre WW2 Yugoslavian postage dues used as dues in Italian occupied Slovenia:



Yugoslav postage due, prepared but never issued, used as due in German occupied Serbia:



Contemporary Yugoslav postage dues overprinted for use in the military administration zone B of Venezia Giulia:



Contemporary Yugoslav postage dues, including charity tax postal due, overprinted for use in the military administration zone B of Trieste:

Malta this time, nice early and genuine use



Recently acquired from Delcampe.

Great items Bamra, especially being used

During the life of the Jhalawar Post Office (1886-1901), you were out of luck if you received mail from outside the State. You paid postage due on it.

This ½ Anna Gwalior State postal stationery cover from Ujjain in Gwalior



to Jhalrapatan, the capital of Jhalawar, would have been carried without extra charge anywhere in the British Indian system. However, mail deliveries inside Jhalawar were the prerogative of the State PO, and unless franked with State stamps, were charged postage due. The back of the cover shows the British Indian Jhalrapatan receipt CDS of 9 June 1896, and lower down the 'Mahsul' ('Postage Due') cachet of Jhalawar



Detail of the cachet:



1896 wasn't an especially good year for Jhalawar-British relations. That year, the British deposed the ruler of Jhalawar, and three years later transferred a very large chunk of state territory to the neighbouring State of Kotah. (Which also issued stamps, regardless of what the catalogues don't say - and good luck to you if you have any genuine ones!)

I know these must be common as dishwater, but this is the first one I've ever found. So....that's kind of cool.



And a one pounder at that!

While trimming out stamps glued into an old album last night, I spied this non-descript Malayan postage due. It ended up in the pile, but on looking it up in my 2003 catalogue, I found it could be worth a few bucks!



Went though the pile numerous times, even pulled the shredded album out of the recycling box. It was after midnight when I finally found it (listed in the album under Straits Settlements, not Malaya) only to find it's value at $.20. Typical. Shows you what the hint of 'wealth' will do to a man.

Now let the record show that neither the heading of this thread, nor the first posting, specifically uses the word 'stamps'. So here I go with a brief outline of the Postage Due etiquette marks of Yugoslavia.

By far the most common is the unboxed 'T' which exists in more sizes and styles than you can comfortably shake a stick at:




But there do exist 'T's boxed in circles and squares:



Also there are explanatory etiquettes which translate as 'Charge for Delivery. Postage due of .... dinars.' The second is a very weak strike and you are probably going to have to take my word that it is exactly the same text in Cyrillic. The third, in lower case Latin script, I have just bought, but has not arrived yet; so I offer the auction picture. (N.b. the 'T' in triangle is from the French dispatching office, not the receiving office at Skopje)




Now for a couple of slightly more interesting items. The first is a circled 'Porto'. This is a Hungarian not a Yugoslav style. It was used in the office of Palic which had been Hungarian before the WW1, and again during WW2 when the Axis invaded Vojvodina. So I suspect that this was brought in by the Hungarians in 1941, and after liberation the PO hung on to it:



Finally what do you make of this?



I had seen one like this before and simply assumed that after the insuffient stamps had been machine cancelled the PO had noted the insufficiency, taken it out and applied a 'T' handstamp. But here the double cancellation gives the game away. This is actually a machine cancel for Postage Due! Why bother to create a machine for something so unusual as postage due? Because the date is late August 1989, in the midst of the first phase of hyperinflation; they had had 6 changes of postal rate in 12 months and could (rightly) anticipate many more to come. So the number of incorrectly paid postal items at the main office in Zagreb was probably increasing to the point where they justified machine handling!

Chile 1894. Señor Borne, the Post Master at Valparaiso, in October 1894, secured a quantity of gummed, perforated buff paper from H.C.Gillet. First issues (12th Oct.) had the rectangles upright, further printings were made in Nov/Dec. As this example is horozontal I assume it is from Nov/Dec.

Nice thread, looking very nice! Here are some I am lucky enough to have in my collection from Great Britain, some have been shown already, but I will include them all for visual appeal.

Here are some used blocks for the visual compendium: