Please Help To Identify Japanese Postmarks On Telegram Forms – 1890's"

Help sought in identifying the contents of these telegrams and the postmarks.

I think that the telegrams are circa 1890's?.

Your help would be most appreciated, thank you

1.



2.



3.



4.



This form below was together with the above telegram, could this have been a receipt for sending the telegraph?







Thanks for looking

Andrew

Hello Andrew, interesting items again.

About the postmark, I have compiled a simple how-to for reading Japanese numerals, especially for the classic style, so that one can figure out (at least) its date.





And as for example, your first and third date stamps could be read like these;



Hope this help to sort out the dates of your documents and covers.

- Hironobu

The location of the postmarks are as follows;

1: Miyazu P.O., Tango (now Miyazu city, Kyoto prefecture)

2 & 3: Kyoto Imade-Gawa P.O., Yamashiro (= Kyoto prefecture)

4 & 5: Kyoto Nishi-jin P.O., Kyoto prefecture.

- Hironobu

Hello Hironobu,

What can I say.....fantastic breakdown to how to read Japanese numerals, thank you so much for your time in producing these tables.

I am sure that there are other collectors who will benefit from using these guides as well.

I have tried reading a few more of these telegram forms in my file, I must say with a little practice I am just about able to read the dates (more practice is needed).

I don't think I will be posting similar requests for date translations unless I encounter a problem postmark.

Once again thank you for sharing your knowledge.

Andrew

This is very interesting. The title of the form literally reads as "Communication Inquiry Sheet", asking for inquiry of the receipt of the telegraph. The content is,

- asking the recipient to fill in the date and time of receipt, and returning the form to the postoffice, and

- asking the recipient to notify if the recipient has not received the telegraph, or if there was any inconvenience on delivery, or if there is anything to be noticed, and returning the form to the postoffice.

By returning the form to the postoffice, the recipient is asked to fold the form so that the return address of the postoffice be shown.

The direct translation of the inscriptions and the suspected folding for return should be like this;



Thanks again for the nice puzzle !

- Hironobu

Hironobu,

Thank you for your detailed analysis of the form.

One thing is puzzling me, was the form delivered to the recipient together with the telegram,
and can I presume the form was not returned to the post office?

Andrew

Hironobu,
nice treatment of Japanese numerals.
Well done.. Very helpful.

Andrew,




This is also puzzling me...

The word in the form title, "Tan-Mon" (the third and forth characters from right) means "to investigate and inquire", and also noticing the form asking to inquire any inconvenience on delivery, I reckon this is a sort of customer questionnaire and should have been delivered to the recipient after the telegram has been delivered.

And in order to confirm that this guess is plausible, I've done a time line analysis of the telegram and the form. Here's my results:



Through observation of the telegraph and the form, we can confirm that;

(1) the recipient's address is "south, Moto-Seiganji-dori, Inokuma-dori", which means the "south corner / area of the crossing of Moto-Seiganji street and Inokuma street" (this is a typical way of describing the address in Kyoto city) (with high confidence),

(2) the telegram has arrived the delivery post office (Nishi-Jin PO) at AM 9:06 (with high confidence)

(3) the form says that the "estimated delivery date and time" to be Jan 31, PM 9:13 (this with less confidence as the hand script is pretty hard to decipher)

(4) the date stamp on the form says that the delivery time is PM 1 - 2 (high confidence)

Now the question : "Can a telegram be delivered to the recipient within 7 minutes or so after arrival ? "



Assuming the location of Nishi-Jin post office is the same as today, the estimated distance from the post office, the distance to be delivered is approximately 600m on the map. Assuming the average walking speed of adult person to be 80m/min, that distance is equivalent to about 7min and half. Thus if rushed (and I assume there were less traffic at that time) it would be theoretically possible to deliver the telegram within 7 minutes or so, and that makes the quickest delivery time to be 9:06 + 7 min = 9:13

And noticing that the delivery time of the form is PM 1-2, the form should have been delivered AFTER the delivery of the telegraph.

The recipient might have been a bit lazy to answer the questionnaire and have kept it with the telegram.

Well, this was another fun for me. Thanks for the puzzle

- Hironobu

Rod, thanks for the kind words.

I haven't seen this sort of description on Web, so I just thought this might aid our non-native colleagues to decipher the Japanese date stamps :-)

- Hironobu

Hironobu,


Your guide to reading basic Japanese numerals as been a great help. I have managed to translate some 30+ dates stamps with some confidence, a big thank you!


Now back to the above telegram:

Reading through your further comments and analysis of the telegram inquiry form, prompted me to take another look through my 'pending file'.

As a result of this search, I have found a further telegraph which by all accounts could relate to the enquiry form in question and has nothing to do with the above telegram. Although the telegram & enquiry forms were together? The recipient's address looks the same in both telegrams?





This telegram is dated January 29th and the inquiry form was sent on January 31st together with a telegram of the same date.

It maybe probable that the inquiry form relates to the telegram dated Janary 29th and that the recipient chose not to reply?

This telegram may help to solve the mystery?

Andrew

Andrew, great to hear that the numeral guide helped you !!

As for the new telegram, yes the recipient is the same as the former telegram and the inquiry form. The sender is also the same person, and the content is pretty much the same, asking to send some money.

As you've mentioned, it is indeed plausible that the inquiry form was asking for the delivery of this telegram. However, as I recall the extremely good and well managed service of the postal system in these days, it might be also a bit odd that the telegram has been kept for two days at the post office before delivery.

Further investigation required, but this is the real fun about this hobby :-)

- Hironobu

Hironobu,

Many thanks for your detailed findings, it has certainly been an eye opener...not only for me but I guess other interested collectors....

I will try and keep my queries to a minimum by keeping away from my 'pending file' but the desire is too great to resist at times, as I am busy with translating the dates of Japanese postmarks.

Also I have neglected my work on the 1873 documentary revenue stamps, which I must resume. Checking out the perfs is proving to be time consuming.

I've been trying to locate a copy of the Furuya 2011 5th Edition Japanese Fiscal Stamp Catalogue, but there appears to be non available via the web? Or even a copy by Shimomura, either a 2003 or 2011 edition.

Any ideas where to try?

Andrew

Just wanted to add my thanks to Hironobu, this will make studying my Japanese stamps far easier and much more enjoyable!

Andrew,




Unfortunately all of them are now out of print, and even the second hand copies are difficult to find. Indeed, I am also looking for the Shimomura 2003 or 2010 for a long time without success...

The problem with the revenue catalogues are that they are published in such limited quantities that once out of print it becomes quite scarce in the market

- Hironobu

Thanks Hironobu,

Andrew