Does anyone still collect blocks?

 

 

In the post-World War II era, mint blocks of three-cent commemoratives were widely collected in the United States. And even kids in my Minnesota village could afford to buy blocks of all the new issues given the government’s restrained issuance policy. In my birth year, for example, the United States issued only seven commemoratives--all in three-cent denominations. At the post office window, the total cost for the seven blocks was only 84 cents ($8.11 in today’s money, after you adjust for inflation).

Back then, we were impressed by a local banker who could afford to collect full sheets of these commemoratives. His investment was considerably greater than ours ($10.50, or $101.37 in today’s money).  But with the glut of new issues that the USPS churns out these days, that banker today would be collecting singles!

As an investment, these blocks of commemoratives paid no dividends, but at the end of the year I had a nice showing to display of what the government had released over the past 12 months.  Admittedly, I used them long ago for postage. But remembering the pleasure of collecting blocks back in the 1950s, I’ve started a collection of Luxembourg covers franked with blocks.

Here are a few recent and not so recent additions:

75c (+20c) 1927 Caritas
Princess Elisabeth

Junglinster, 20 Feb 1928, transit Luxembourg-Ville [b/s],
to Zürich, Switzerland [b/s], 21 Feb 1928

UPU 20g letter rate = 1.50 F
UPU registry fee = 1.50 F

 

60c (+10c)  1929 Caritas
Princess Marie-Adélaïde

 

Luxembourg-Ville, 9 Jan 1929, Brussels, Belgium, 9 Jan 1929,
London registry [b/s] & London Dulwich [b/s], 11 Jan 1929

UPU 20g letter rate = 1.50 F
UPU registry fee = 1.50 F
Belgian airmail charge = 75c

10c + (5c) 1930 Caritas
Prince Charles

Remich, 9 Jan 1931, to Breedene s/Mer, Belgium,
75c 20g concession letter rate to Belgium

10c (+ 5c) 1932 Caritas
Countess Ermesinde

Luxembourg-Ville, 2 Jan 1933, to Versailles, France,

1.25F 20g concession letter rate

10c (+ 5c) & 35c (+ 10c) 1934 Caritas
John the Blind

Registered 20g UPU letter to Austria posted 19 Dec 1934
from Luxembourg-Ville (overfranked 5c)

12½c G.D. Adolphe
definitive

23g letter, Luxembourg-Ville, 2 Feb 1904, to Trier, Germany [b/s]

20g-250g letter rate = 25c

Registry fee to Germany = 25c

3 Rpf. Hindenberg
(WWII Occupation) 

Lintgen, 25 Oct 1940, to Lorentzweiler, 12 Rpf. letter rate

Dachau to Pétange in June of 1944 – mail from Prisoner No. 64388 – Johann Scholtes

 

 

WWII concentration camp mail -- Dachau, 7 June 1944, to Pétange

When I find a prisoner-of-war or concentration camp cover, I often wonder who the writer was and what happened to them.   One such cover is shown above.  It was sent from Dachau in June 1944 by Luxembourger Johann Scholtes of Pétange, who was born in Roeser on 20 November 1892. 

The Dachau records indicate that Scholtes was transferred to Dachau on 26 February 1944 from the Hinzert concentration camp, where many members of the Luxembourg resistance were confined.  He was assigned No. 64388 and imprisoned in Block 2/2 3K.

The United States Army liberated the Dachau concentration camp on 29 April 1945.  Some 428 days after he had arrived, Johann Scholtes was one of the prisoners liberated on that day.  Presumably he was repatriated to Luxembourg, although I don’t know the rest of his story.

Here is his letter home, still contained in the cover, and bearing the Dachau camp postal censor’s cachet at the end:

 

Finding covers with unusual rates or to uncommon destinations is especially challenging for collectors of modern postal history

 

 

Covers with exotic contemporary uses are more difficult to find than in the past. Even common uses franked with definitives or commemoratives can be elusive as the use of electronic mail and social media, such as Facebook and Twitter, supplant personal and business mailings.  And today many companies shred their incoming commercial covers to comply with privacy laws and frank their outgoing mail with meter imprints.

Fortunately there still is a small number of collectors of modern postal history who actively search for and save what little of this scarce material that remains to be found.  If postal history collecting survives into the 22nd century, these covers will be the gems of the future.

Here are a few examples from my collection of incoming airmail to Luxembourg from the United States:

 

30c per ½ oz. Airmail Rate to Europe

28 Apr 1939 to 1 Oct 1946

Carey, Ohio, 25 Sep 1946, to Rodenbourg, Luxembourg, with
30c Theodore Roosevelt Presidential Issue sole franking.

30c per ½ oz. Airmail Rate to Europe

28 Apr 1939 to 1 Oct 1946
+

20c Registry Fee

1 Feb 1945 to 1 Jan 1949

New York, NY, 26 Jul 1946, transit Luxembourg-Ville, 30 Jul 1946, received Mondorf-les-Bains [German cds with “Bad” excised]

15c per ½ oz. Airmail Rate to Europe

1 Oct 1946 to 7 Jan 1968

Chicago, Illinois, 25 Apr 1964, to Rodenbourg, Luxembourg, with
15c Montgomery Blair commemorative airmail sole franking.

21c per ½ oz. Airmail Rate to Europe &
60c UPU Special Delivery Rate

21c Airmail:  1 Jul 1971 to 31 Dec 1975
60c Special delivery:  16 May 1971 to 18 Apr 1976

 

 

Kansas City, Missouri, 26 May 1973, to Neiderwiltz, Luxembourg, with backstamps of Luxembourg-Ville and Wiltz on 30 May 1973.

The 21c airmail nicely pays the airmail postage, while the 60c special delivery stamp pays the special delivery fee.  Posted by Robert F. Schaeffer, Luxembourg’s honorary consul in Kansas City at this time.

Boulaide to Prinkipo, Iles des Princes, Turkey, in December 1921, showing registered sole use of the one-franc Marie-Adélaïde

 

Unusual origins coupled with exotic destinations—that’s what adds gusto to a cover collection.  Here’s an example.

 

 

Boulaide, 19 December 1921, to Prinkipo,
on Turkey’s Princes’ Islands

The one-franc Marie-Adélaïde definitive nicely pays the 50c UPU 20g letter rate and the 50c registry fee, both rates having taken effect on May 10, 1921.  The backstamps show transit through Galata in Istanbul on December 26th to Prinkipo, on the big island of Büyükada, the largest of the nine so-called Princes’ Islands in the Sea of Marmara, near Istanbul.

One can only wonder what the writer from Wiltz, who posted this letter from Boulaide during the winter of 1921-22, was telling his correspondent in Turkey, who might have been sunbathing that winter’s day on the Prinkipo beach.

Here’s an old postcard showing the beach near Prinkipo:

 

I seldom find a Marie-Adélaïde cover that I dislike (just ask the German dealers who visit Bangkok!), but this well-preserved gem is a very special addition to my collection of one-franc Marie-Adélaïde covers.  I’ll surely be thinking of it my next visit to the quaint villages around the Lake of the Upper Sûre.

Late sole use of the 17½c G.D. Marie-Adélaïde official on a 1920 cover in G.D. Charlotte’s hand!

 

Grand Duchess Charlotte posted this cover on January 24, 1920, slightly more than a year after her reign began following Marie-Adélaïde’s abdication on January 14, 1919.   By then, her elder sister was in exile, having joined the Carmelite convent of the Little Sisters of the Poor in Modena, Italy.  Three months earlier, Charlotte had married Prince Felix of Bourbon-Parma.

The first series of definitive stamps featuring Grand Duchess Charlotte was not to appear until 1921, so in 1920 the Marie-Adélaïde definitives and officials were still commonly used, with the 17½c paying the concession 20g letter rate to Germany.  This rate remained in effect until December 1, 1920.  On that date, the German concession rate was increased to 25c, eliminating the need for a 17½c stamp. 

Here the 17½c Marie-Adélaïde official pays the letter rate to Basthorst by Hamburg [post: Möhnsen].  The cover is addressed to Baroness Anne Marie Bruselle, who was Marie-Adélaïde’s lady-in-waiting, and who Edith O’Shaughnessy says she referred to as her “sixth sister.”  Endorsed in purple “Service de la Grande Duchesse” and bearing the indicia of the “Palais Grand Ducal Luxembourg” on the flap, the distinctive handwriting is that of Grand Duchess Charlotte.

It is a pity that covers like this appear on the auction market with no indication of their royal provenance.

  

Baggage fee in 1912

 

 

From the early 1900s, you’ll find postcards featuring a postman about to deliver a letter, such as the example above.  And often a “bag” would be attached to the card containing a strip of photos.

 

In this instance, the bag contains 10 photos of Brussels (above).  So should what is ostensibly a postcard pay the letter rate in view of the bag and its enclosure?

Brussels, Belgium, 8 August, 1912, to Petange,
9 August 1912 – taxed 10 centimes

Apparently “yes,” as this card, which was sent at the 5-centime postcard rate, was taxed 10 centimes (that being double the 5-centime deficiency from the 10-centime letter rate then in effect).

That charge reminds me of the ever-increasing fees we pay at the airport for bags, extra bags, and the carbon emissions air travel produces!

 

Bogus use of a surcharged 6-centime postal card (updated below by Boettger and Doose)

 

 

 

On May 1, 1878, the 6c German treaty postal card rate was increased to 12½c, rendering obsolete Luxembourg’s six-centime postal cards. Frugal Luxembourg, therefore, recalled and surcharged an unsold stock of 7,000 six-centime cards to the 5c domestic postal card rate. These surcharged cards were issued on September 10, 1878.

Three different cards were surcharged: accordingly to Moens, 500 of the 6c violet (P. 25/P. 16) and 1,000 of the 6c carmine (P. 26/P. 19) Fifth Arms issue, and 5,500 of the 6c carmine Sixth Arms issue (P. 27/P. 21). Thus, the surcharge can potentially be found on each of the 38 plate types comprising these three cards, including the three printings of P. 21.  (My plating study of the surcharged cards appeared in the Luxembourg Collectors Club journal Castellum, Vol. 9, No. 3 [December 2005].)  As Moens’ data suggest, P. 25 and P. 26 are much scarcer than P. 27.

Collectors apparently quickly bought up many of the surcharged cards; as a result, commercial uses of these cards are seldom seen. In fact, I am unaware of any reported use of the 6-centime (violet) 5th Arms issue surcharge (P. 25).

But beware of faked uses such as the example below of P. 27 (type 1 - third printing):

 

 

· The postmark is dated November 3, 1876. The surcharged cards were not issued until September 10, 1878.

· The ink is not typical of the period.

· The handwriting is a poor imitation of the fluency of the cursive writing of the 1870s.

· Use of red for the text and address is peculiar.

· Diekirch is misspelled “DierKich.”

· The message reads “Cher Jean” and is also signed “Jean.”

While the card and the surcharge are genuine, the postmark, message, and address appear to me to be bogus.

Comments?

 

Lars Boettger comments:

This cancel was cleaned after 1885 and used mainly on postal stationery with bogus addresses and messages. You will find these items in collections of well known and knowledgeable philatelists. The break in the circle occurred some time in 1877/78.

Hans-Ulrich Doose comments:

The only used P. 25 ever seen up to now belongs to M. Robert Scholtes (I have enclosed a scan for you).

[Here are his scans of this unique gem (part of the Eltz correspondence)!]

 

Diekirch to Serang in 1900; Luxembourg-Gare to Matadi in 1901; Vianden to Puerto Principe (Cuba) in 1896

 

Serang, Indonesia (47 miles west of Jakarta)

The G.D. Adolphe postal stationery provides a rich range of uses, much to the postal historian’s delight. 

The first of the three Adolphe postal stationery issues was valid from May 4, 1895 until the end of 1908.  During this period, postcard and postal card use reached its zenith, providing a popular economical medium for personal and business communication. 

Happily, the Adolphe cards, now over 100 years old, remain plentiful.  There are no records of how many were printed.  You’ll find a few with scarce cancels, others with interesting uprated uses, and some to exotic destinations, as shown by the three cards below, occasionally for only a few dollars or euros (depending on the seller’s acumen!). 

So keep your eyes open at the bourses and on the web.  Luxembourg’s neo-classical postal stationery is still underpriced and underappreciated, but that might change!

 

5c Adolphe stationery (1st series)
Uprated UPU use from Diekirch in 1900
to Serang, Indonesia

Diekirch, 21 Aug 1900

Luxembourg-Gare, 21 Aug 1900

Postagent Penang [Malaya], 17 Sep 1900

Singapore, 19 Sep 1900

Weltevreden, Netherlands East Indies, 24 Sep 1900

Serang, Netherlands East Indies, 24 Sep 1900

 

*   *   *

 

Matadi, near the mouth of the Congo river,
just upstream from Banana and Boma

5c Adolphe stationery (1st series)
Uprated UPU use in 1901 to
Matadi, Belgian Congo

Luxembourg-Gare, 3 Jul 1901
Written at Mamer, showing the cachet of
Bois-J.B. Plüger-Grains.

Matadi, Belgian Congo, 26 (?) Aug 1901

 

*   *   *

Camagüey [formerly Puerto Principe], in central Cuba

10c Adolphe stationery (1st series) 

UPU use from Vianden in 1896
to Puerto Principe [now: Camagüey], Cuba

Vianden, 20 Aug 1896

Havana, Cuba [b/s], 2 Sep 1896

 

Luxembourg airmail within Europe: May 1, 1939 to the October 1, 1940 required use of Reichmark franking

 

Effective May 1, 1939, foreign (Belgian, French or German) franking was no longer required to pay international airmail supplements on airmail originating from Luxembourg. 

And, according to the Basien-Hoffkamp rate book at p. 173, from that date forward there were only two rates for airmail to other European countries:

• 50c per 20g for letters to Germany, France, Great Britain, the Netherlands, and Switzerland
• 75c per 20g for letters to all other European countries

The first two covers illustrate these rates.  The rating of the third is a mystery.

Airmail to France
24 Jul 1939

50c airmail supplement

Luxembourg-Ville, July 24, 1939, to Nice, France, July 26, 1939, properly rated at the 20g letter rate to France (1.25F) plus a 50c airmail supplement.

Censored Airmail to Finland
31 Jan 1940

75c airmail supplement

Luxembourg-Ville, January 31, 1940, routed via the Netherlands and Sweden, from the Finnish consulate in Luxembourg, censored in Finland, with February 1, 1940 Brussels transit and February 6, 1940 Helsinki backstamps.

The cover is properly rated at the 20g UPU letter rate (1.75F) plus a 75c airmail supplement.

Officially Resealed Airmail to Italy
13 May 1939

Rate ???

Luxembourg-Gare, May 13, 1939 (less than two weeks since the abolition of the foreign-stamp surcharges), routed in manuscript “Via Cologne,” to Merano, Italy, May 17, 1939, with a strip of four official seals reading “Amministrazione delle Regie Poste,” each dated May 17th [Drummond Type OS2].

Here the franking totals 3.75F.  As a 20g UPU letter, 2.50F would have paid postage and the airmail supplement, with the letter overfranked by 1.25F.  As a 20-40g UPU letter, 4.25F franking would have been required [1.75F + 1F + 75c + 75c], leaving the letter underpaid by 50c. 

Is the letter incorrectly franked?  Somebody must know, and I hate to describe a lovely cover as “misfranked.”