Poland-Postage Due 1919 -Forgery

Here is a common forgery ,that is found in most W.W. collections .

more examples---

Higher values with the forgeries on the right .

At first glance the stamps look the same, Is there an easier way to tell the difference?

Forgeries are perf 11 as opposed to perf 11½ for the genuine.

There's more to these than just plain "forgeries"

These Postage Dues were issued 9 Sept 1919. In orange for the northern part of Poland where the currency was in the German fennigs & marks, & blue for the southern part whose currency was the Austrian halerzy & korony. They were printed on medium wove paper, perf 11½, 9 stamps in each set, figures of value between 2-500, but no denomination indicated.

Here's a nice example of the 20h used on a cover from Wolkowysk to Warsaw

1919 25 Nov. The letter rate was 25f so double the deficiency has been charged

In May 1920, with the unification of the Polish currency into fennigs & marks, four of the blue southern values were reprinted on thin laid paper (vert & horiz) & the value taken as fennigs for use throughout the whole of Poland.

A parcel receipt, Sambor 6 April 1921 bearing the reprinted 500f value


Here's were the fun begins. Both sets of postage dues were forged by the Germans, initially as POSTAL forgeries. The plan was to flood the market with stamps & currency in order to destabilize the new Polish economy. In the event, by the time the forgeries were ready the genuine ones had mostly gone out of circulation so they were dumped on the market as PHILATELIC forgeries.

Apart from the perf differences it's difficult finding any variation between the two given the printing was average to say the least

The other issue that was similarly forged is the "P.K.L" (Polskiej Komisji Likwidacyjnej) issue of Cracow, Feb 1919. Here the differences are more obvious. Check out the "thistle" (my nomenclature) on either side of the upper shield. On the genuine (left) it's quite clear & obvious, on the forgery (right) it's a blur



The dots around the stamp are another giveaway if you've got large margins. On the genuine the dots are very fine if at all visible, on the forgery, great big blobs in comparison

Genuine - left, forgery - right





Here's a genuine pair, you can barely see some dots on the left



Finally, a really dumb mistake, the value is 2 halerze not halerzy

Great information on forgeries.
Information on forgeries is hard to find on line
Do you have more?

Lots more, but only about Poland as it's my area. I've always been a sucker for literature so over the years I've accumulated whatever I could find, much of it from members of the Polish Philatelic Society in Melbourne. I moved up country 8 years ago & lost touch with them, (most of the original members have now passed on) but now the net is a good source of books, if you can find them.

Yes, online info on Polish forgeries is scattered, even the Poles don't have much, in fact all I've ever come across is in English. I haven't found a Polish forum that's as active about Poland as this one is about the States & Canada or the Aussie forum where the wealth of knowledge about Aussie matters is encyclopedic.