Canarias Aéreo - Aurioles 42 - 44 - Colour

The Canary Isles depended on air mail services between Las Palmas and the Peninsula. Soon after the nationalist uprising began on 17 July 1936, the republican government commandeered all aeroplanes. A flight that had just left Las Palmas when the uprising started.

The nationalists were able to capture a few aeroplanes that were being maintained in Cádiz and one that was damaged at Sevilla. Because these aeroplanes were required to move troops from the territories in Northwest Africa to the Peninsula, there, no longer was a regular air-mail service between Las Palmas and the mainland.

Lufthansa,however, continued to operate flights between Germany and South America that landed on Gran Canaria. In October 1936, the local government in Las Palmas reached an agreement with Lufthansa on the carriage of mail from Las Palmas to Burgos and Germany on the homebound Lufthansa flight TO 191. This came at a cost that was covered by the overprinting of ordinary stamps.

The overprinted stamps had to be used in addition to the ordinary charges. On 16 July 1937, the local government issued three stamps that commemorated the anniversary of the military uprising. Where the overprints had been on ordinary stamps, this overprint was on 5 C local "beneficiencia" stamps of Las Palmas. The overprinted values were, as usual, 50 C (in chestnut), 80 C (in green) and 1'25 PTA (in violet). The stamps are listed by Aurioles as nrs. 42 - 44 and by Edifil as nrs. 31 - 33.

On a recent trip to Spain, I spent a night in Madrid before catching a train to Galicia, a day later. As I had some time left, I walked around the centre. On my way back to the hotel, I popped into the Filatelía Arias shop in one of the arcaded galleries of the Plaza Mayor, hoping to add to my collection.

They had the MNH set described above. I did not submit the three stamps to a closer inspection until today.



Neither the salesperson, nor I noticed that there are two 1'25 PTA stamps and no 50 C stamp.

Aurioles lists the 1'25 PTA stamp with a pale lilac overprint. It, also, lists errors of colour. The 1'25 PTA, erroneously, was overprinted in green. The extra 1'25 PTA stamp, however, appears to have a grey overprint. This colour is known to have been used in error on a stamp from a later series.

The overprint looks correct, not faded, and the underlying stamp is genuine.

I know nothing about this issue, nor have either of the catalogs.

However, a quick look notes the center stamp has a different perforation rate than the two end stamps.

Aurioles only mentions a perforation gauge of 14 x 13. Edifil (Unificado) does not mention any gauge. As good as Aurioles is, he is neither infallible, nor complete (Graus certified stamps not even listed by Aurioles).

The perforation does not really give rise for concern. It is a characteristic of the stamp that was overprinted and not the overprinting that made it a postage stamp. The underlying stamps were plentiful. I have no doubt about the underlying stamps. All three have the correct and very characteristic watermarks.

The stamp in the middle has the violet overprint that is listed in both catalogues. The normal stamps, including the pale lilac variety, are not expensive either. Many of the more valuable overprints have been forged. But those were less elaborate overprints that were easy to forge. And even then, the forgers got it wrong.

Looking at listings on ebay and Todocolección, the greyish colour appears quite common. Also, a line perforation is very common where Aurioles states the 14 x 13 gauge is a comb perforation.

I do like the colour varieties. At the same time, it annoyed me not to have a complete set. There was a nice-looking set in ebay at a low starting price. Being the only bidder, I got the lot at the opening price plus € 2 postage from Spain.



The 80 Cts. and 1,25 Pts. stamps are further colour varieties.

In the 1946 Sanabria, they are listed as 38, 39 and 40. Crosses and circles watermark, perf 14x13.5. Runs of 20,000 (38), and 40,000 (39 and 40).

Sanabria has them one day later, July 17. FDCs have red cancels instead of black.

Also listed are 41, 42 and 43, same values, but orange (50c), violet (80c) and green (1.25P). Print "runs" were 25, 100 and 100 respectively.

As for availability for postage, Sanabria says that the larger run was limited by the nature of the issue, and the smaller run was restricted.

As for incidence of use, the smaller run was not available for commercial use due to early and excessive philatelic purchases.

Fun stuff. I've grabbed a handful of the Canaries over time. I should get them pulled together.

Those are Aurioles 42E - 44E. The 50 Cts. with orange overprint was a colour proof that was rejected. The other two were errors: colours of the two top values were mixed up.

The 50 Cts. with orange overprint will set you back € 1,000 unused with trace of a hinge.
The other pair (catalogued at € 138, with hinge trace), recently, was offered and sold for € 60.

A lot of covers with any of these Canarias stamps are philatelic.

Edifil coincides with Aurioles. It gives 16 July 1937 as issue date.

I found a reputable dealer offering below cover with the red cancellation for 17 July 1937. He does not claim it to be a first day cover.



I am highly suspicious of this cover. First of all, there was a strict procedure for posting mail. That would not have involved any special first day service. What is even more suspicious, is the censorship mark. I doubt it is real. It is not the style used in Las Palmas.



A further red flag is the destination of Sevilla. This is the preferred destination for a lot of 'Canarias' fakes. The rather undetermined adress is another red flag. And "Magestit" is a very suspicious name. The "g" before an e is doubtfull outside Cataluña and Valencia. And using that language in that era was risky. Also, that "t" at the end suggests a foreigner wrote it.

At € 150, I would stay far from that item.

If he's a reputable dealer...perhaps everyone is in on the joke?

Who knows? Maybe it's the going price for one of these philatelic concoctions/confections. It's certainly a colorful piece of stamp-collecting history (as opposed to postal history). The "sender" even managed to incorporate an invert. (Of course he did.)

As philatelic as this 1937 issue was, there must be first day cancels from 16 July? (I haven't looked.)

It's always possible that Mr. Sanabria and his team were piecing together information from around the world at a very chaotic time, and saw material such as that cover and drew incorrect information from it?

Or the creator of the cover had access to Sanabria's information when pulling it together?

Whenever I'm looking at old reference material - Sanabria, Robson Lowe, society journals, etc. - I allow for the likelihood of later scholarship clarifying the old information. But I nevertheless consider that those guys were plugged in, and are still worth throwing into the mix.

Calling the orange a "rejected proof" and the other two, "errors of color" is polite, and perhaps correct.

This one small run has many of the familiar hallmarks of the "clandestine" philatelic printings. We get a rejected proof, errors of color, inverted overprints, doubled overprints, se tenant missing overprints. Sanabria says 5 copies are known of the orange and brown overprints doubled on the same stamp.

I could imagine that the printer runs the five orange and brown doubles for himself, gives the oranges to a few friends, the swapped colors to his best dealer/buyer, and the doubles, inverts and missing overprints to the next tier of dealers. I suppose a government minister has to be cut in somewhere.

In the 1946 Sanabria, the errors of color are priced at US$200 each. The orange-and-brown doubles are not priced. In 1946, the average new car was US$1,125 and one year of tuition at Harvard University was US$420.

Were all of the collectors of that era suspending their collective disbelief, believing they were buying rare errors, or did everyone know exactly what was going on; paying extra for one of the five se tenant missing overprints was just the cost of bragging rights to own one?

I think most collectors knew what was going on. (I don't mean the Boy Scouts buying bags of stamps for five cents...I mean the collectors who were chasing these creations.)

The orange ones are considered real. Graus has certified them. As I wrote, Aurioles identifies the orange as a rejected proof. Other stamps also exist with an orange overprint in error. The colour was used and issued at the end of October 1937.

All the overprinted 'Canarias' issues were approved by the Junta de Defensa Nacional in Burgos. They were overprinted in a workshop of a local bookshop in Calle Triana, Las Palmas. This was done for the local authorities. Most were overprinted line by line. One or two issues were overprinted two lines at a time. Sheets were fed manually for each line.

This dealer would not be the first to offer fake material. Reputable auction houses also failed to identify fakes. Last year, one auction house sold a collection, warning that inspection of the lot was required. I noticed a couple of evident fakes.

The number of 100 for the two errors of colours correspond to a sheet of each that was printed with the wrong ink that should have been used for the other.

The contracts for the fee paid to Lufthansa are verified. The price was set per kilo of mail carried, which resulted in these three tariffs. Although there is no doubt there was a requirement for these overprints. The many overprints result from the expectation that, soon, there would be a regular airmail service again. There, however, is no evidence that Iberia started operating before May 1938. Most print runs were for about a month's supply,

Still, it has been suggested that, also, speculation played a role. The high number of errors, in part are due to the process. However, it is very probable manipulation was involved as well.

Edit: the Graus certificate mentions the issue of 16 July 1937, approved by the Junta de Defensa Nacional.

The watermark:



I came across a suggestion the paper for the local benefit stamp could have been old German stock.

The watermark bears a passing resemblance to the Wurttemberg Kreuze und Ringe mark,



and to a lesser extent, some later, better-nourished German watermarks.

Good stuff.