1851 3c Washington Stamps

Here is a group of three 3c Washington imperfs that I just received. Is the first one an orange-brown #10A? A nice group of stamps that are well centered. Two are margin copies. I paid less than $5 for the group. Any other information is appreciated.

These are all good stamps for someone who would like to try plating.

Stamp 1 has the weak right frame line typical of the right column of the left pane of plate 1L. So an 11A, not a 10A.

Stamp 2 has a nice impression, but not a typical 10A color. I'd start with plate 3, then 2L.

Stamp 3 has frame lines typical of plate 4. Several plate 4 stamps have guide dots (below the lower right diamond block) that are diagonal "dashes" instead of dots. Only one of them is an exact match.

Not sure how much info you want, since I know you like to plate things yourself to learn how to do it.

ttreen provided very good info. Better than I would have.

I'll add that all 3 are B reliefs.

With that and ttreen's observation, I'll just say that the left stamp can be plated very quickly (already did it).

The middle stamp is obviously a bottom row B relief. No guide dot since bottom row.

The right stamp is a B relief with a guide dot, which if you recall from 1c stamps, is pretty normal for a body of plate stamp.

The left stamp is another variety of B relief with no guide dot from the 10L column. Same as 1c stamp B reliefs in the 10L column.

Once you understand how these plates are made it gets easier. The 3c stamp for these plates used a 3 relief roller, like Plates 1,2 & 3 of the 1c stamp. The top row relief discussion gets a bit weird on the 3c stamp - but just think C-A-B with C in the top row, except not on a lot of the early OB plates where I don't know that anyone fully understands what is going on, and so it just gets called the "T" relief. Whatever it is.

I don't understand how they plate these stamps without proper plating drawings. The Chase drawings do not show me much if anything to go on. The idea of compressing the vertical size to get a distorted border line and compare to other similarly distorted images is odd. You would have to know which one it is or suspect first. I am missing something trying to plate these. I have never had any luck with them. Feel free to post the position if you know so I can compare them.

The left stamp is 30L1L.

Like on the 1c plates, once you know its a B relief, you can quickly narrow down the rows. Sheet margin at right means 10L/10R. ttreen explained the weak outer right line -- also the top half of the UR diamond block is heavily gouged, which is the Plate 1L signature.

Between these two terrific resources, you have much of what you need to plate these, short of just reading the Chase book to get background.

http://stampplating.com/
http://www.stampsmarter.com/feature...Plating.html

Learn the reliefs.

Learn the Identifying signature characteristics of each plate.

Those two things will take you a long way.

Prior to the internet, the way it was always done, was each plater had to get a copy of the Chase Photos from the Smithsonian. They are orderable. 3c stamps would be plated from those photos and the Chase book information. Now, with those websites, and the Chase photos incorporated into one of them at least, things are better than ever.

So, I understand where you are coming from - you are used to plating drawings, and such, ala Neinken/Ashbrook. You won't get much of that with the 3c stamp. Just use photos.