Canal Zone Airmail Cover - Cancelling A Mistake

I practically fell over when I saw this one.

The postal worker picked up the wrong canceller one day. All he could do was re-cancel the cover with the correct cancel.

Interesting smauggie.

What I am not sure about is: Since the cover was processed in the Canal Zone, is it possible that this cover was taken on board, or mailed at a port of call within the canal and the cancel is appropriate here? Maybe the postal clerk was just being thorough??

It will be interesting to see the comments on this thread.

Chimo

Bujutsu

That is a great question, Bujutsu. I will tell you the reasons why I think this was not posted on board.

Reason 1 - The Air Mail stamp. As far as I know airmail stamps were not used on board ships for mailing items.

Reason 2 - The return address is Rainbow City, Canal Zone. That means the writer lived in the Canal Zone.

Reason 3 - The Canal Zone Postal System was very conscientious in its use of cancels. A second cancel would never have been placed on the cover unless there was a good reason (such as the cover was cancelled incorrectly)

If others have other viewpoints on the cover I would love to hear them.

Good points smauggie

I guess we have ourselves a mystery

Regarding the use of airmail stamps, I have a postcard somewhere in my albums from Hong Kong that has a seapost type cancel but also an "AIRMAIL' marking as well. I guess, depending on the country, they weren't that fussy about how the mail was conveyed or marked accordingly?

Chimo

Bujutsu

Just for additional info, Rainbow City did have (at this time) its own post office, but the distance between Rainbow City and Cristobal is less than 3 miles, so it is not a surprise it was processed in Cristobal.

It appears to me to be the same date stamper, it was just that the first cancel was without the "paquebot" slug in place, or upon canceling the stamp the slug fell out and was restamped before the slug was replaced. Just my hypothesis!

What you say would make sense except for the evidence that the first cancel would have been the one cancelling the stamp, and the place where the paquebot "slug" would be are two arrows indicating that there in fact was no slug, but two separate cancellers. Cristobal was the largest post office in the Canal Zone, so it does make sense that they would have entirely different duplex cancels for regular and paquebot mails.

I also support the idea that there are definitely two separate cancellers involved. Take a close look at the two CDS's side-by-side. There's a distinct difference in not only the bottom "PAQUEBOT" marking but also the typeface used in the date (specifically note: the letters "MA" in "MAY"):

Upon a closer look, I agree, also the "7" in the date is seemingly different. Good eyes!