5 Centavos Sonora Coach Seal Stamps

Looking for information on 5 centavos Sonora Coach Seal Stamps. My guess is 1914 revolution postage stamps, but I am unable to find any info. 2 stamps on cover. Thanks.

Nice stamps but they look like reprints.Yours have a much stronger background color . Maybe a later printing ? I don't specialise in Mexico ,just comparing yours to mine .

Appears to be Scott #396a, 1914 as you suggest, orange & green, with inscriptions in black. Regarding reprints, Serrance Guide does not include any 20th century entries for Mexico. Follansbee catalog of Classic Mexico ends in 1910 (I have both books).

If you desire more information, you could do an inquiry to the Mexico Elmhurst Philatelic Society International ( www.mepsi.org ). Or maybe someone who knows these 1914 stamps better than I do; even though I'm a MEPSI member; will come along.

I looked in Follansbee's "The stamps pf the Mexican Revolution 1913-1916" and found some useful information.

That is a "Sonora coach Seal" issued2 Oct 1914, Scott 396a (orange and dark green). They were printed in sheets of 40, with two panes of 20 stamps arranged tete-beche. A pane consisted of two rows of 10 stamps, and there were 4 different "settings" of these 20 stamps (but Scott 396a exists only in settings I and IV). Settings are best identified by the background pattern, and you should look at Follansbee's book if you want to understand how it works (it takes several pages).

Both of your stamps are from setting I. Your top stamp is row 1, #5, and your bottom stamp is row 2, #7. Also, Follansbee says "In general, stamps from Setting I have backgrounds printed in darker inks with a somewhat watery impression while later stamps are paler." (this seems consistent with floortrader's comparison).

Follansbee gives some information on philatelic and manufactured covers--if you want to post an image of the entire cover, I can see if there is a match.

Thanks guys, appreciate the effort here. I am a member of MEPSI, but I've not had a lot of luck with the forum MEXIMAIL.
Here a picture of the cover.

Interesting! The two stamps are an unseparated pair. The address is not in Follansbee's list of questionable philatelic or manufactured covers. However the cancel date looks suspicious. 23 October 1919, 7AM if I am reading it correctly, which seems rather late for a 1914 stamp. You will need an expert to check that.

(I have never used MEXIMAIL, and don't know much about it.)

I cropped the picture for just the cancel, first pic.

Then dropped it into retroReveal. Not sure exactly how to read the cancel, but it looks like you're correct on the date. Interesting.

Thanks for the additional reference, Seigaku. I don't have that particular Follansbee book. Will look for it.

The book can be downloaded here.

http://www.collectorsclubchicago.or...andbooks.php

SEIGAKU ------Here is what I got in a worldwide collection ,as you can see there is a large range of shade differences .

That is a nice representative batch of stamps, floortrader. In addition to the color variability, it shows all three major issues of these. The rays on the 1914 coach seals barely touch the value number, but the rays of the 1915 anvil seals pass down through the number. The anvil is easily seen underneath the word "centavos." The bottom two stamps are anvil seals with the additional word "plata" (meaning silver), and were issued slightly later. The 50 centavo is an anvil "plata" type, but the seal itself is missing--some of these were used and are known on cover.

Found this on ebay and thought it was interesting.

That is a nice sheet. I just looked on ebay and saw 2 more--a sheet of 20 centavos coach seals, and a sheet of 5 centavos anvil seals (mis-described as "coach seals") Follansbee says that sheets sell at 10% over the individual value of the stamps--not a large premium.

You can see the different layout for the anvil shields (not tete-beche)