Why Did the U.S. Need a New Issue in 1861?

On December 20, 1860, South Carolina voted to secede from the United States. Over the next 37 days South Carolina's secession was followed by five additional states. On February 4, 1861 the 6 states that had voted for secession formed the Confederate States of America. Four additional southern states would later join the C.S. of A. Mail service between the North and the South continued until the May 28^th proclamation that all U.S. postal service in the seceded states was to be suspended on May 31^st. With the South assuming control of the southern post offices on June 1^st, it immediately became necessary to demonetize all issues that were held at the Southern post offices. The National Bank Note Company delivered the new 1861 issue stamps during the 2^nd week of August. Rushed into production the new issues were similar in color to the older issue but differed in design.

Fig. 1. A comparison of the 10¢ 1857 Scott #35 at left versus the 10¢ 1861 Scott #62B at right.

Demonitization was performed city by city. The local postmasters would advertise in local newspapers that citizens had approximately 2 weeks to redeem old stamps after the local post offices received the new issues. For a period of time, both the 1861 and 1857 10¢ stamps were valid for postage.

Fig. 2. Mixed franking with both the 10¢ stamps of 1857 and 1861 used on a patriotic cover from Georgetown, CA to Oswego, NY on Nov 5, 1861.

When the U.S. government had requested bids to produce new stamps in 1861 they required all bidders to submit essays of the new proposed stamps in complete sheets which have been gummed and perforated. The winning bidder, the National Bank Note Company, submitted essays for the 1¢, 3¢, 5¢, 10¢, 12¢, 24¢, 30¢ and 90¢ stamps. These essays have come to be known as the "Premieres Gravures" or the "August Issue". Most of these essays were not the same designs as those of the actual issued stamps. There are a number of possibilities for why the design change was required. One proposal is that the original designs were not done under the supervision of the government while another is that the government was not satisfied with the original designs. While we do not definitively know the reason for the design change we do know that in almost all cases the essay designs were not put into production. However, in the case of the 10¢ stamp, the original design as well as the altered design were both issued. The first issued stamp is called Type I, has the Scott designation number of 62B and its earliest known use is August 20, 1861.

Fig. 3. 10¢ 1861 Type I Design.

The second design, Type II, is known used as early as Sept 17, 1861.

Fig. 4. 10¢ 1861 Type II Design.

It is not known why both design types were put into production but it is generally accepted that that the plate bearing Type I was put into use because the initial demand for the 10¢ stamp was greater than expected. The Type I stamp is by far the rarer of the two types with perhaps only 2% of all 10¢ 1861 stamps being Type I. Lester Brookman estimated that 500,000 of the Type I stamp were issued while 27,300,000 of the Type II stamp were issued. The Type I stamps seem to be primarily used between August 1861 and March 1862. The Type II stamps are primarily used from Sept 1861 up through the end of the 1860's. It is believed that the Type I stamp may have been produced from 1 printing. Type I stamps were printed from plate #4 while Type II stamps used plate #'s 15 and 26. The two types have the following differences:

Unused blocks of 4 of both Types I and II are known, but are quite rare with only 3 or 4 known of each.

Fig. 5. Unused #62B Type I.

Fig. 6. Unused #62B Type I Ð Block of 4.

Fig. 7. Unused 10¢ #68 Type II.

Fig. 8. Unused #68 Type II Ð Block of 4.

Fig. 9. 10¢ 1861 stamps, Types I & II, used provisionally on a red Wells Fargo Transcontinental franked envelope. Postal regulation required Wells Fargo to frank government issued entires. Due to the demonetization of the previously issued Nesbitt entire, Wells Fargo for a very brief period, printed their frank on plain white envelopes.

Fig. 10. Vertical strip of 3 of the 10¢ Type I (#62B) 1861 stamp used to Paris, France.

Fig. 11. Horizontal strip of 3 of the 10¢ Type I (#62B) used with 3¢ 1861 on cover from Boston to Port Elizabeth, Cape of Good Hope.

Fig. 12. Horizontal strip of 3 of the 10¢ Type II (#68) used with 3¢ 1861 on cover from Battle Creek, MI to Sierra Leone. Carried by British Mail with London transit and Detroit exchange office markings.

Fig. 13. 10¢ Type II (#68) on blue folded letter cancelled by the Hiogo, Japan small circular postal marking. Carried on the Pacific Mail Steamship Co. Oregonian which carried mails on the alternate route between U.S. consulates in Japan and China. This is the only known 10¢ 1861 cover carried by U.S. mails between 2 Japanese cities.

Fig. 14. Pair of 10¢ Type II (#68) stamps used with 5¢ Hawaiian stamp (#32) on Nathan correspondence cover originating in Hawaii and addressed to Victoria B.C. Double cross border cover with the stamps paying the rate from Hawaii to the U.S. (10¢ U.S. & 5¢ Hawaiian postage) and the rate from the U.S. to British Columbia (10¢ U.S.). Manuscript "3\=" indicating express fee due in British Columbia.

10¢ Type I Reentry - In 1922 it was discovered that one position on Type I (#62B) stamp had unusual plating marks. Apparently, a 90¢ 1861 stamp had first been entered into position 94L on plate #4 and upon realizing the mistake, a correct stamp was reentered into this position. The result being a 10¢ stamp that shows small characteristics of the 90¢ 1861 stamp. There are approximately 3 or 4 known copies of this reentry and it is known both on and off cover.

"TAG" Variety - The "TAG" variety has been well known to philatelic students for many years. On some Type II 10¢ stamps, the letters "TAG" in the word "POSTAGE" have heavy markings. This is most likely caused by some type of adherence to the transfer roll which resulted in a change in the impression made upon the plate. This variety can be found as a single stamp and in multiples.

Fig. 15. 10¢ Type II (#68) "TAG" Variety.
Picture courtesy of Robert A. Siegel Auction Galleries.

During the early years of the 1860's the U.S. government became concerned over the possible cleaning and reuse of previously cancelled stamps. While it is doubtful that this was done to any great extent it led to various processes that could prevent this occurrence. This resulted in the U.S. issuing stamps in 1867 and 1868 with grills. Grills are produced by running the gummed and perforated sheets of stamps through a machine that produced a waffle-like pattern onto the stamps. It was hoped that the grills would make it impossible to remove the used stamps from envelopes without damaging them. Different types of grills produced different types of grids pressed into the stamps. The different grills have been assigned different letter designations based upon the grill size and grill direction. More information on grills may be found, courtesy of Robert A. Siegel Auction Galleries, at http://www.siegelauctions.com/enc/1867.htm.

In the case of the 10¢ stamps of 1861, only Type II (#68) stamps have been found grilled. Three different grills have been found used on 10¢ stamps resulting in 3 different issued stamps. They are:

1868 "Z" Grilled Stamp

The 10¢ "Z" Grill is one of the rarest of all U.S. issued stamps with 6 single used copies known at this time. Lester Brookman estimated the quantity issued at 2,000. The 10¢ "Z" Grill is not known used on cover.

Fig. 16. 10¢ "Z" Grill (#85D).

1868 "E" Grill 10¢ Stamp

Unlike the 10¢ "Z" Grill, the 10¢ "E" Grill (#89) is known both on and off cover. Off cover copies are known both used and unused and as singles and blocks. Lester Brookman estimated that 1,500,000 of the 10¢ "E" Grill were issued. The largest known unused blocks of the 10¢ "E" Grill are vertical blocks of 6. The earliest known use of the 10¢ "E" Grill is 2/21/1868.

Fig. 17. 3 copies of the 10¢ "E" Grill (#89) used with 2 copies of the 2¢ "F" Grill (#93) on a blue folded letter from San Francisco, CA to Lima Peru.

Fig. 18. 6 copies of #89 10¢ "E" Grill used on preprinted envelope to Havana, Cuba.

Fig. 19. 2 copies of the 3¢ 1869 (#114) used with a 10¢ "E" Grill (#89) cancelled by a negative 5-pointed Star in circle on a preprinted envelope from Hartford, CT to Copenhagen, Denmark.

Fig. 20. Strip of 4 of #89 10¢ "E" Grill (#89) used on quadruple rate cover from St. Thomas, Danish West Indies to New York. Carried by the U.S. & Brazil Steamship Co. ship Mississippi.

1868 "F" Grill 10¢ Stamp

The 10¢ "F" Grill (#96) was issued approximately 3 months following that of the 10¢ "E" Grill with May 28, 1868 as its' earliest known date of use. It was also issued in greater quantity with Lester Brookman estimating the total at 3,800,000. As would be expected, the "F" Grill is known both on and off cover. Similar to the 10¢ "E" Grill, the 10¢ "F" Grill is known off cover both used and used and multiples of each are known. The largest known multiple of the 10¢ "F" Grill is a block of 18.

Fig. 21. Unused corner block of 4 of the 10¢ 1861 "F" Grill (#96) with gum.

Fig. 22. 5¢ 1861 (#76), 10¢ "F" Grill (#96) and 2 copies of the 2¢ 1869 (#113) stamps paying the 19¢ North German Union Closed Mail rate from New Orleans, LA to Intra, Italy.

Fig. 23. 10¢ "F" Grill (#96) and 30¢ "F" Grill (#100) tied by circle of wedges cancel paying the quadruple 10¢ rate to Hong Kong, China by the Pacific Mail Steamship Co.

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