Nice Civil War Photo Lot

I just got this lot in the mail today. When I bid at auction I had high hopes that it might go unnoticed... but unfortunately at least a few other people saw it and realized the value. It ended up being a good deal, just not the amazing deal it might have been.

I wish they had handstamped or printed cancels and that the one at upper left wasn't munched, but still a nice group.

Nice find! I always look at the backs of old photos at antique stores. I rarely see any with the revenue stamps and if I do it's usually torn off part way.

One fairly nice, 3 cut in, 2 damaged. A nice lot if in the $200-$250 range.

rev... awesome find... good eye !

Here's an interesting tidbit: I just read on the internet that the photography studio of F. & M. Merwin of Newton Falls, Ohio, were only together for two years (1866-1868) which should help to pinpoint the date of the first two images.

Further, it is worth noting that the two who were the photographers were both women, a partnership between sisters by the names of Frances A. Merwin (born circa 1838) and Marion A. Merwin (born circa 1840).

I'm not sure how unusual it may have been back in the Civil War era for women to be in a partnership business as photographers, but it seems interesting nonetheless.

Nice lot! In addition, the top middle photo is quite unusual because the subject appears to be smiling. which is hardly ever seen in photos of this period

Here are more examples from a 2008 thread if interested.
https://goscf.com/t/71&whichpage=1

So the photographer would have some of these stamps on hand and charge customers the amount of the tax. That must mean the photographer also cancelled the stamp?

It came in at roughly half that amount.

In case anyone missed it, the significance of this lot is not the subject matter or that the CDVs have stamps (which are actually quite common; run-of-the-mill stamped CDVs are $3-10 items), but rather the specific stamps that were used. They are all R17c, cataloging $175 each.

Photos were only taxed for 2 years, 1864 and 1865, so dating the images is easy enough in that general way.

Mild correction: While it was indeed a 2-year span, it straddled 3 calendar years. The tax was in effect from August 1, 1864 through July 31, 1866... so there are 1866-dated cancels on CDVs that are legitimate.

Given that the Merwin sisters only came into business in 1866, along with the fact that the tax stamps were in effect only through July 31, 1866, would suggest that the first two images were taken during the first seven months of 1866. Just another piece to more accurately date the images.

Also, the last card, with image taken by Brown, Williams & Co. of St. Louis seems to have a manuscript cancel reading August 8, 1864, which suggests the image was taken within the first week the new tax was put in place.

More on Brown, Williams & Co. here:

Sorry, I should have mentioned that when including the link. The first group weren't even playing card stamps, just a mixed bag. I found it interesting that at a certain point you could use any of the stamps to pay the tax.

Actually legally you couldn't. The original idea was to use each stamp for only the purpose it was labeled for. It became obvious almost immediately that this was a totally impractical idea, so by December of 1862 a memo went out stating that proprietary and playing cards stamps were to be used interchangeably for only those types of products and all other stamps could be used interchangeably for any other tax requirement needing stamps. Since photographs are proprietary articles this stamp was a legal use.
The end result of that memo was that the government stopped ordering one, two cent orange, three, and four cent playing cards stamps and just used proprietary stamps for almost everything. The two cent blue had a very large initial printing, so it is far more common than the others.

Congratulation on a wonderful find. Keep posting your good finds as it's a real treat to view them! Thanks

Time to bump this CDV thread!

Over the holiday I took a dive into CDVs on ebay - I believe there were about 50,000! there

I ended up buying 3 lots for myself for Christmas. The card with the R17 hasn't arrived yet, but here are some I got in the mail today:



most of the CDVs I'm interested in are those with graphic backs and/or first issue revs. This one is lovely.

This next one could be an example with a genuine misperf...



A small but very nice typographical back mark...



And two printed Gill's City Gallery examples...





here are the fronts...

and here are some I got last month in Asheville, strictly for their back marks...