Britain And Ireland Postcard To Panama

Hello All

The post card below is from London to Colon. This card was sent to R. Suggett, an agent for the Royal Mail Steamship Pkt Co. ( aka Cunard ship lines ) in Colon. One cent postage seems a good rate for such a distance. But of course it took 55 days to get there. I wonder why so many days?

My Scott book does not show this card. Can someone please provide a number and catalogue value for it.

There are three postmarks on the front and one on the back. The London cancel reads as 1894. The second readable postmark is that of Panama. What type of cancel is this? The back shows a Colon postmark which I assume was the local delivering cancel. Why have two different postmarks for Colon Panama and both with the same date?

There is a third cancel on front( difficult to unreadable at upper left ). What I think it says on the bottom is Corinto. And on the top it may say Nicaragua. There is a Corinto Nicaragua located on the Pacific side of the isthmus. Colon is located on the Atlantic side. If I am correct, why a Corinto postmark? What do you think my have happened here?
Thanks for any response.

Hi, HTx, this is a piece of postal stationery, and since Scott does not list these for countries outside of the US, you will not find them in their catalogues. I have collected Great Britain for years, and have gone about as far as I can afford on the regular issues and have recently started to collect postal stationery, but have less than 100 pieces so far out of what is probably at least 1,000 to 2,000 different items. My only source of reference is a Michel catalogue of Western European postal stationery from 1986, so it's not only hopelessly out of date and lists nothing issued since late 1985, and the prices are in Deutschmarks, but it's better than nothing and has been quite useful to me to help me know at the very least what's out there. Your card was issued in 1892, and is listed as Michel number P 28, one penny carmine on cream, and the price is given as 1 DM,used or unused, which at the time I believe was worth about 25 US cents, and was also the minimum price given for any item listed in the catalogue, so I don't think the ensuing 34 years have done much to boost the value. Interesting card, though and I myself much prefer used postal stationery, because you can see where they've been. I think Michel agrees with me because for a lot of the stuff from the Victorian era, used cards and stamped envelopes list for more than their unused (you can't really call them "mint") counterparts.

Postal Stationery of Great Britain
T Brightmore (Undated monograph)
Page 20
Yours Type 7. You can work out the variety.

Note: It is Type "G" I am presuming "STO = Stamped to Order, as of the users livery printed on reverse.

I can't imagine that Panama was that common a destination at the time, so I would take that old value with a big grain of salt. I don't think it's worth a lot of money, but it should be worth a little something.

Brightmore listed it at 1GBP (Gt Brit pound) circa 1982
(For a clean unused card)
Used cards are not priced, due to Pmks / destinations etc.

Thank you all for responding. Your information was much help.
I will list this as Michel #_P_28 , type G , STO , cream / buff , 1892 .

After a little bit more digging the blurred cancel (in picture number three) is indeed a Corinto, Nicaragua postmark. It is referred to as a Third Period Cancel. "It was used mostly without the killer (earliest proved date is November 8, 1890) and reached its end in 1893."

So I'm back to square one. Since I cannot see the date of the Nicaraguan cancel, I must assume it is earlier than 17 Dec 94. If the cancel reached its end in 1893; how and why is it on a post card dated 17-12-94? ( a year later ) Why go to Nicaragua at all? Especially on the pacific side.

The average steamship line traveled to Central America from Europe in about 20 days. This card took 55 days. Perhaps the mailman of yesteryear isn't any different than today's mail person. Sometimes it just gets on the wrong boat.

Corinto was the famous town on the Mosquito Coast(annexed by the British).We can assume the card first touched Corinto before being forwarded into the canal zone.Conflicts between Great Britain and Nicaragua at the time may be the reason for the long delay.
Your card is very interesting and not common at all IMO.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nicar...isis_of_1895