1857 Scotland - Local Postmark On Entire - Any Ideas ?

Hello everyone
I am new to this forum and would like to make a brief introduction of myself. I am a collector of interesting European postal history I have an entire with GB 1d red cancelled with a double line local Scottish postmark " Handler Street " adressed to the Earl of Taquair. The reverse bears a CDS " Posted since 7 last night - G Oct 22 - Edin 57 " and arrival " Peebles OC 22 - 1857 ". I would appreciate any information on this postmark and entire. Many thanks






*** Moved by Staff to a more appropriate forum. ***

Hello Chrisgat,

Welcome to the forum.

That's a very nice cover indeed.

The postmark is from the receiving house in Hanover Street in Edinburgh.

It was addressed to the Earl of Traquair, Traquair House, Peebles which is about twenty miles from where I used to live.

THe house is supposed to be the oldest continually inhabited house in Scotland. Here's a picture from Wikipedia:



This letter was sent to the eighth (and last) Earl and the house passed to a cousin when he died. It is still owned by a member of the family.

He house is famous for its gates which are not to be opened until a Stuart monarch is back on the British throne.

It also now produces very good specialty beers.

Here's the house's own web site:

http://www.traquair.co.uk/

In case anyone is wondering why the gates in the picture I posted are ajar, this is a different set of gates from the ones that are to be kept shut!

Here are Traquair House's "bear gates" which stay closed:

Hello Niglec

Many thanks for the useful and interesting information . Would you know how common or uncommon the handler street postmark is ? or maybe where I could learn more on local Scottish postmarks. I appreciate your help and interest.

As already stated by nigelc, it is a HANOVER STREET straight line local postmark. There is no HANDLER STREET postmark in Edinburgh.
The HANOVER STREET local postmark exists as a straight line, two line, and a circular postmark. The straight probably being the most common.

Hi Nigel. Are there any places that have a similar tradition about not reopening their gates until a Canmore is back on the throne? One branch of my ancestry traces back to William I "the Lion" whose standard is essentially now the Scottish flag. As you know, the Canmores lost the throne of Scotland to the House of Balliol who lost it to the Bruces who in turn lost it to another Balliol who lost it to the Stewarts/Stuarts. So, for me personally I see the Stuarts as usurpers of usurpers. Though of course that is not to look closely as how we Canmores usurped the Dunkelds who usurped the Alpins. :) :)

Hi,

the Hanover postmark was that of a receiving house located at 33 George street.

Somewhere in 1853-1854, don't have access to my books so I can't say exactly when, the receiving-house moved from 54 Hanover street to 33 George street, but the postmark was not changed.

George and Hanover street were very close as it can be seen from a map of 1844:



From data of circa May 1857 from Edinburgh there was only one daily mail to Peebles.

The mail box for Peebles closed at 5:30am at the GPO of Edinburgh and at 10:00pm at the receiving offices.