Old German Help, Please

Does anyone here know what these are?

They came in a collection of Bavarian stamps.

It seemed that knowing what Retourbrief/Retourbriefe and Rudbriefe meant could provide me with a clue, but putting those words into a couple of German to English online translators brought back nothing.

Using my limited understanding of German, it appears that these are offical post office labels for lost letters.

Brian

If a letter was undeliverble and the sender couldn't be determined from the outside of the envelope, the letter was sent to an office (Commission für Retourbriefe, or Office of Return Letters), where it was opened and the contents examined in an attempt to ascertain the sender. The letter was then resealed with one of these labels and returned to sender.

There are various designs. Michel only mentions them in passing in its Germany Specialized, but there are entire specialized publications covering just these issues. I don't have a copy handy so I can't be 100% sure, but if memory serves, these were used from around 1870-1910ish.

Thank you, PostmasterGS. With the help you had given me with German material in the past, my thought was that if anyone knew anything about these labels it would be you. They are essentially for use by dead letter offices, then.

Thank you too, Brian. It looks as if you had the right idea about them, after all.

I used the wrong word ('lost' instead of 'dead'), but I'm glad you understood my gist.

The labels made sense to me without knowing their history, but I am a bit amazed at the actual details behind them. It's easy to forget that other countries don't take privacy as seriously as we do in the US. A letter would never be intentionally opened here without a court order.

In fact, letters are opened at the dead letter office in order to return them to the sender when they can't be delivered. It's their function. Years ago, maybe 20 to 25, I taped a makeshift label onto and envelope and covered the stamp with tape. My return address was not on it, but eventually it came back to me by way of the dead letter office which had opened it in order to return it, with the notation that taped-over stamps could not be accepted for use as postage.

In the Deutschland-Spezial (Michel), the Bavarian "Retourmarken" appear just before the Telegraph stamps, and as you might guess, they are worth vastly more used than mint. More commonly-seen Retourmarken appear after the Wurttemberg officials.

Thanks Doug.

So if used, these would have been cancelled?

It seems unlikely for labels, doesn't it?

They did not have to be cancelled, though many were.

Here's a discussion of these issues on PhilaSeiten. It may be hard to follow if you don't speak German, but there are a couple nice photos of them used on cover at the bottom. The third photo is of the front cover of the definitive work on these issues.

Thank you, I don't know German but will have a look.

You can plug the URL into Google Translate and get the gist of it.

OK, I will do that.

I plugged the URL into freetranslation.com and it did an acceptable job. It seems the specialists prefer to see these on cover to prove their genuineness and use. I like the story about what was claimed to be a great rarity on a postcard, except for the fact that it wouldn't be on a postcard because there is nothing to be opened on a post card to determine who had sent it.

Despite the statement made by one of them, I don't find these to be plentiful on ebay. I plugged the words into both ebay and BidStart, yesterday, and come up with one example between the two sites that looked nothing like those I have. Will have to try the ebay Germany website.

They mention Bavaria on the web page, and these came with a collection from Bavaria. Are they Bavaria specific.

Also, are they anything that would interest you for your collection and/or website, or are they out of your realm?

While I scanned 5, I have 8 of them, all different. There are two from Augsburg that are similar but the size and typography differ.

Württemberg also used retourmarken, but of a different design.

I'm afraid they're out of my collecting area. I gave up on German States early on for a variety of reasons.

Just though I'd ask. Thanks for the help in getting me on track.