Poland 1919 Gniezno Provisionals

Here is a pretty little piece, which purports to be a vertical pair of the 1919 Gniezno 5 on 2pf Germania provisional:



This one seems to be pretty well done, but I still assume it to be a fabrication. The difficult thing for me is that there seems to be some variation among the claimed-genuine stamps that float around the Interwebz, some of which have certificates.

If you have other examples of Gniezno provisionals, or comments on this one, please post away.

[edit: I see that the scan has some dust. The extraneous marks are not on the stamps.]

I'm not familiar with this Polish provisional and am utterly unqualified to comment on it. I just chimed in to say that the number of various overprints on the Germania series never ceases to amaze me. I almost half expect to see ones pop up overprinted with Kans. or Nebr.

As you have noted, these Polish provisionals; as well as the Polish overprints from the same time period on various Austrian stamps; have been extensively forged. May be worth a bit of time and money to get them expertised so you know what you have.

I have no idea why they are called the "Gniezno" issue, they were printed in Poznan due to a shortage of 5 & 10 fen. denominations. By the time they were issued in August 1919 regular Polish issues had become available. There has always been a "speculative" smell about these two stamps, virtually all covers are philatelic.

Little was known about the printing of these even up to 1938 when the first major Polish catalogue, "Polskie Znaki Pocztowe" was published & incorrectly listed both stamps as being overprinted both typo & offset. It wasn't till the great Polish philatelist Wladimir Rachmanow found the original printing formes & studied them that all was revealed. Life-size illustrations of the formes were included in the 1960 edition of "Polskie Znaki Pocztowe" vol 1.

The 5fen was printed by L. Kapel of Poznan, they only had 8 figure 5s so there are 8 types of the overprint. They were printed typo so under decent magnification you can clearly see where the edges have been squeezed out forming a thicker border of ink around the figure 5. If the printing is offset, no border edges, then you've got a forgery. Typo forgeries were also made.

Here's the measurements of the 5Fen


The printers only had 8 figure 5s so this is how the sheet was printed in 13(!) operations


This is Type VI Position 96 with a constant flaw in the lower hook




An example of a Litho forgery


An example of a Typo forgery



The 10fen was printed by I. Goldberg of Poznan & there are 100 types of the 10 Fen, each one is different on the sheet & plateable by measurement to the tenth of a millimetre, a binocular microscope with x20 magnification is ideal. These were printed offset as were forgeries although typo forgeries are known. One characteristic of the ink is that it wasn't mixed properly so that shiny blobs show throughout the overprint. This is best seen when viewing the stamp at an angle at eye level or under a microscope.

Here's the measurements of the 10Fen, I've Anglicized the headings




During WW II a cache of both values was found in the ruins of the Poznan post office, some badly water-damaged others quite OK, some of the better ones are known re-gummed or with back-dated cancels.

Here's an example of the 10fen position 96 from the Poznan "find", perfs a bit damaged & no gum, but a genuine copy for $8, yes please.



The 5 Fen is known overprint inverted, mucho dollars here, the 10 Fen not so although bogus copies show up on ebay & for $5 I couldn't resist



A note about Wilhelm Heinze
You will commonly find copies signed "W.H" on the reverse. "W.H"= Wilhelm Heinze was a part-time stamp dealer & postal clerk at one of the Poznan post offices when these stamps were issued in 1919. He also had a daughter, Margarette. Margarette worked at the Berlin post office. You can see where this is leading.

Now, the first of these "Gniezno" issues that Heinze sold & produced covers with were genuine, but they sold out within a week & Heinze had forgeries made very quickly. He then produced covers with a mix of genuine Polish unoverprinted stamps & forged Gnieznos, put registration labels on them with genuine cancellations on the stamps, off to Berlin under separate cover where his daughter dutifully gave them genuine German backstamps. They look really, really nice & there's heaps of them around. The problem is that there are Heinze covers that are genuine.

A 10fen Heinze forgery


A final anectode. Before I moved away from Melbourne I attended the Polish Philatelic Society & they kept me financially poor but immensely rich with their knowledge. I bought a pile of 30-40 Polish philatelic magazines from one of the members who had a nice collection of the Gniezno stamps & covers. A month or so later I was going through the mags when a cover with both values on it fell out. I contacted him to return the cover & he figured he might have been reading the mag, someone came to the front door & he might have put the cover in as a bookmark (!). Next Christmas he gave me a used pair as a gift & when I scraped together the money he sold me a cover at a very reasonable price.

Here it is. 5fen Type VI pos96. 10Fen pos14


Bibliography:-
Polskie Znaki Pocztowe, Bialytsock 1938
Polskie Znaki Pocztowe Vol 1 ,Warszawa 1960
Filatelista #4 1957, Warszawa
Filatelista #4 1973, Warszawa
Polonus Bulletin December 1974, Berwyn Ill.

YeaPolska
Thanks for sharing this most useful and interesting information! It seems I need to find my microscope. I suspect my set are forgeries, anyway you have given me some clues for a study. Well done

One question arises from me - does anybody know the ratio genuine versus forgeries?

Great stuff! SCF delivers again.

Good information and sounds like a impossible task to determine a real one from a scan . The typo forgeries look like they can be seen on a scan but the litho needs measurements .

I'd say 90% or more are forgeries. The only way to determine a genuine one is to measure it which means you know which type or position it is, & you're certainly going to note that information on the back of the stamp. I assume that anything that has no info on the back is a forgery & I'm suspicious of signatures, they're easily forged & in many cases are not proofers signatures but rather dealers.

I've used a very basic biology stereo microscope to examine mine. 20x magnification is all you need, the details just jump up & shout at you. The scope is also good for the Polish Krakow issues of 1919.

I've never used a scanner to check for forgeries, my scanner only goes up to 1200dpi, which is what I've used for the images I've posted, & I don't believe that that resolution is good enough. I think you'd get good results at 2400dpi with a suitable digital measuring device calibrated to a tenth of a millimetre.