#9 - Help Understanding Mobile, AL Cancels

I really enjoy looking at 1¢ Franklins with bold red Mobile, Alabama cancels. Can someone tell me more about their history? Are those with a black cancel from a later date? Some examples have both a red and black cancel - was it used as a carrier cancel, too?

The Mobile cancels are great.

A quick unrelated passing comment - I trust that you know that your top 1c stamp with the red cancel is pos 89R1L, which has the broken/weak bottom line. A key Ty IV position piece.

You should be able to find some info on Mobile here:

https://d2jf3tgwe889fp.cloudfront.n...-Alabama.pdf

Thank you, txstamp! Where did you find that cancel reference? It's looks like something that would be great to have.

https://www.uspcs.org/resource-cent...ver-catalog/

Classics society website.
This is the American Stampless Cover Catalog

I always liked the red Mobile's myself.

Here was a 1c'r I had - position 61R2, Ty II #7




This is useful in regard to your original question, in that this is a plate 2 stamp.
The EKU of Plate 2, if I recall, is 12/1855.

With the July CDS on this, and perforated stamps replacing imperforates in July 1857, that makes the use of this CDS most likely either 1856 or 1857.

That is a great looking example, txstamp. Thanks the additional info on Mobile cancels. Hope you will sell me some of your stamps when you are ready to divest.

FYI I sold my 1c collection in 2005.
I mostly do covers these days, but I always enjoy stamps.

Mobile used 3 colors - black, an orange, and the "paint red" as shown above.

Here's a link to an orange and a red in the upcoming Siegel auction:
https://siegelauctions.com/lot_grd....ubmit=Search

and here's an example of the "paint red":
http://states.cgpostal.com/al.jpg

It seems as though during the time of the 1847 issue stamps, up until around 1851, maybe a bit later, Mobile made use of a separate 7-bar grid killer to cancel the stamp. The CDS was struck separately away from the stamp, so as to be readable no doubt.

During much of the life of the imperforate 1851 issue stamps - circa 1851-1857, Mobile quit using the killer, and just struck the Mobile CDS directly on the stamp. They used it as a combined town marking and killer.

I suspect their mail volume went way up during the 1850's and using two separate devices proved a bit tedious.

This affects an off cover stamp collector in that I suspect it would prove harder to find an 1847 issue off-cover stamp with a Mobile CDS, than it would be an 1851-issue stamp.

Here are some 1847 Mobile's from my current collection.

You can see the use of the grid killer here to cancel the stamps.

The 5c cover has a red cancel, the 10c shows the orange.
I don't recall seeing the orange on any 1851 issue stamps.

The 5c cover is ex-Caspary.

txstamp....

Some beautiful covers, txstamp. It's great to see so many responding to my question.

I just bought this #18 from Alan Cohen's sale of part of Wade Saadi's collection. Is it a double stamp from Mobile, too? The cancel doesn't seem to have a complete ring around the grid, and the grid itself appears extra wide. In my research, I saw some New York grids that look similar, but I'm not sure.

Almost surely, this stamp was mailed in 1861, based upon plate 12.

I haven't done any research but grids are pretty common - this could be a New York foreign mail red grid maybe, but not sure.

I'd say the purple cancel is probably some foreign country transit or similar, marking. I don't off-hand recognize it, but if I happen to see it later on, I'll mention it.

Very high odds this stamp was mailed to a foreign country.

Txstamp - You are correct about the other octagonal cancel. The PF cert says it's a French entry marking.

One usually sees the French transits in black or red.
The purple I don't recall, but the apparent octagonal shape certainly fits for France.