Cover From 1872

I recently got this oldie from a bookseller in England.

I'd welcome other comments--but I believe it is #33 (unitrade/scott).

The double split circle cancel on front is from Brigus (pop then of 886, according to NSSC). The back has a St Johns Newfoundland Paid cancel from Nov 15.

To Mr. Baldwin at E Smiths & Co--might be the same Smith Company that traded fish (as in my other old cover recently posted).

As it relates to the addressee, this is taken from an 1871 City Directory for St. John's, Nfld.:

tommy, it is a lovely cover.

tommy, your Newfoundland collection is a wonder but covers like these make it even better. I keep hoping I will stumble over a pence issue on cover at a great price; may be waiting a while.

Gorgeous cover, congrats on the haul. I honestly wish we were taught the same style of penmanship these days, it really is a lost art.

Thanks.

I do not sadly have a pence issue on a cover yet, but it is firmly in my scope. might be a long time too. (though--this cover I found on ebay of all places!)

Lately, I've been wondering where might be old covers sitting in attics or estate sales or boxes somewhere. Maybe I should take a road trip to Newfoundland and scour shops and sales and the like. what say the community? would something like this be productive, or have all the garage sales and the like long been picked clean for odd covers mixed in with grandma's stuff?

Thanks to all for the other comments and information.

I would think it's more of a question of time and patience than anything else, you would have to hit certain avenues like Flea Markets and the like consistently over time. I used to go to rummage sales quite a bit back in the day and maybe once every couple of months I might find something interesting. Although a road trip to the maritimes is always a lot of fun :)

I have been to Newfoundland many times, spending most of my time in the Trinity Bay area with Clarenville as my base of operations. My mother's family came from this area and I have spent a lot of time researching family history. There are still a lot of people in the area who know a lot about the early history of Newfoundland and I have found some really old and interesting material for my research. It wouldn't surprise me if there is a lot of philatelic material in old attics. I haven't gone on a hunt but this is where I would start if I was looking. St. John's is a modern sophisticated city and I expect it has been picked clean.

Well Tommy, seeing as how the Germans just found a closet full of thousands of pre-WW2 paintings and artifacts, I'd suggest that not ALL the attics of the world have yet been purged :)

NBStamper,

Thanks -- this is precisely what I was looking for. It sort of occurred to me that St Johns has been picked. But my intuition was that some of the other areas had a higher chance of discovery (and probably with just as many envelopes sitting in attics from 1860 to 1920.

I'm sort of penciling in a trip just for kicks and will put Trinity Bay.

Any other suggestions from the SCF?

Tommy
This is something that shouldn't be put off for long. The generation which might have preserved this material is aging and there is a slow drift of people out of the outports on the Baccalieu and Bonavista Peninsulas into St. John's and Clarenville which means attics are being cleaned out. It would help if you know some people in the area and I do.

Several years ago, I uncovered in Clarenville a 150 year-old manuscript of poetry written by my ggg-grandfather. It took me a long while to transcribe it (200 hand-written pages of scribble) but it was recently published. Complimentary copies of the book were sent last month to several people in Newfoundland who helped me with the project. I will call them next week and I will bring this subject up and see if they have any suggestions. It likely will not lead to anything but if I find a whole cache of pence issues on cover (ha, ha), I'm certainly willing to share the treasure but a reasonable price will have to be paid to get them from the owners.