Remarkable Cover Story

Wonder if Stanley Gibbons is going to buy it and sell shares.

Don't give them any ideas.......

I wonder what happened with the remaining shares in the British Guyana 1 cent magenta. They borrowed money from a related party to buy it, securing the loan with the stamp. The recent events may have triggered a default. The website, still, offers 80 shares. But the website does not appear to have been updated after they entered into receivership.

I confess that I bought a share just as a total lark. Had nothing better to do with the money at the time. They didn't sell anywhere near as many shares as they hoped. I've filed the paperwork for my share in the same file which holds the title for the square foot of land that I own as a Scottish lord.

Seriously, though, it is a nice article about a fascinating piece, so highly recommended for reading.

Naive question: Wouldn't the first stamp sold and sent from a post office be "A-A" not "H-I"?
Might this mean that there were indeed many earlier envelopes but these were not saved?

It is the earliest known cover, not the first stamp sold.

No one knows how the first stamp was cut from that sheet. There are four corners, and few people will cut from the top down: these were big sheets. 'TL' or 'TA' that would be closest to the clerk and easy to separate may be very good candidates. If the first buyer bought a block, anyone's would be the best guess.

As revcollector wrote, it is the earliest known cover. I am not quite sure anyone can confirm it was the first cover for several reasons.

The first stamps were distributed to post offices on 1 May 1840. The stamps were not to be sold until 6 May 1840, as was the Twopence Blue. The latter, however, was only delivered to few London post offices by that day. The stamps were not valid before 6 May 1840.

A few postmasters may not, correctly, have read the circular instructing them (or failed to instruct their clerks). The stamps were sold and used before 6 May. The earliest known use is 2 May. There may be a cover in someone's attic with a date stamp for 1 May 1840. It has never surfaced, and probably won't. Two stamps used on 2 May are known on cover and one on piece. This appears to be one of the two covers.

Since the stamps should be cancelled by a Maltese Cross stamp that does not show the date, the only way to ascertain the date of use is by the date stamp elsewhere on the piece. Alternatively, an incorrect cancel with date may have been used as is the case with the item being auctioned.

Put in another way: there may be a few stamps around used on 1 May. But as a single, the odds are they cannot be dated. Even the stamp on the cover that is being auctioned would not be datable off cover.

The 'earliest' Penny Black, therefore, will be the earliest known use on piece.

As for what is considered the first Penny Black:
https://www.theguardian.com/artandd...ion-sothebys
https://goscf.com/t/78901

This failed to sell.

And they are holding the $2.5 million dollar cover with bare hands. For shame. Hopefully he washed his hands after having lunch. Or do they call the grease stains "patina".

Something tells me that a few people have held this cover in their hands in a less careful manner.

There actually is a May 1 cover. The stamp was not accepted as payment of the postage (penny blacks were not valid for postage until May 6) and it was marked as due 2d.

The "May Dates" book by Mike Jackson lists another May 1 cover and a number of May 2 covers, though all but 2 of these are said to be errors of dating. The other May 2 cover is "AA" and was mailed by the postmaster of Bath's wife.

The Sotheby's cover sold for £65,000 in 1989, and £1.35m in 1991 (nice return on investment) and was the record for a stamp sold at auction at the time.