A Question About A Marking On A WWII Soldier's Free Mail Cover

Does anyone know what the purple "V" over the "FREE" signifies on this WWII cover? Thank you in advance.

On anything relating to WW2 it usually means "Victory"


Peter

You will see you cover is actually marked "V ...-" which is the Morse code for "V".

Especially notice the posts by rod222 and myself about halfway down the first page of this thead:
https://goscf.com/t/81460

I'm encouraged that there are young people in the hobby, and simultaneously discouraged they don't know "V for Victory." Happy that OP was curious enough to ask, though; that's a good sign.

Folks - thanks for the responses and help. Gosh your assumptions cracked me up - too funny! - I'm not a young collector - been collecting for over 50 years and I know that V is for Victory and that …- is the Morse code for V. FYI, Hubby and I are both rather interested in military history, too. My dad was a WWII Vet so I grew up hearing all about it.

Apologies for being unclear - I should have worded my query differently as this is more of a postal history question. I'm curious about whether or not this was an officially used marking on soldier's mail or was this probably just something the sender applied as part of the Indicia to jazz up his cover.

I'm no authority on postal markings, but I have viewed thousands of WWII patriotic covers on ebay over the years. I do not recall ever seeing this particular imprint. I doubt that there would be any official markings for free soldier/sailor mail since all that was required was that it be marked "free" and the sender include their service number along with name. This was likely created by sender, or someone they acquired it from, to provide a more distinctive "free" marking.

Note that this cover is cacheted, so it probably is philatelic in origin, which would go with the special "free" marking. Normal soldier/sailor mail would not have a cachet, and in most all cases just as a manuscript "free" where the stamp would normally appear.

I can verify that blcjr has experience with WWII patriotic covers, you can view his outstanding Victory VT exhibit here
https://stampsmarter.org/learning/album_VT.html

Don

Cachet looks like it was produced by Thornton C. Shaw with his own poem, then signed by him. Then sent by his son John Shaw back to his mother, Mrs TC Shaw.

From the NARA enlistment records:
John A. Shaw, 35005951, of Erie County Ohio enlisted January 24, 1941 at Cleveland. Born 1919, high school graduate, single, without dependents.

The Find A Grave website links Thornton Shaw and John Shaw as father/son.

Patriotic cachet #8881 in Sherman's "United States Patriotic Covers of World War II" 1999 ed.