UNITED STATES SEMI-OFFICIAL LOCAL ISSUES and CARRIERS, issues for New York

Return To Catalogue - USA Semi-official local stamps and carriers - United States

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1841 Washington, various designs

Genuine, image obtained from a Siegel auction, manuscript C&P
(Genuine stamps)

(Genuine, reduced sizes, images obtained from a Siegel auction)

Inscription "CITY DESPATCH POST"
  2 c black on green (1847)
  2 c black on lilac (1847)
  3 c black on grey (1842)

Inscription "CITY DESPATCH POST" with "C" at both sides of head
  2 c black on green
  2 c black on grey
  2 c black on red
  2 c black on yellow
  2 c black on brown

Inscription "UNITED STATES CITY DESPATCH"
  3 c black on lilac
  3 c black on blue
  3 c black on green

Surcharged (oldest surcharge in the world, 1850)
  "2" (red) on 3 c black on green

Two stamps with an inverted "C" at the right hand side. Images obtained from a Shreves auction

Cancels:

(Typical cancel, "US" and "FREE" in an octogonal shape)

Forgeries:

Taylor forgeries? or Scott? I've seen this type of forgeries in many colors: black, black on green, black on lilac, black on yellow and black on red. The hair at the right hand side is rather peculiar.

Sperati forgery:

(Front and backside of a Sperati forgery)

Sperati forgery on piece of paper, image obtained from a Siegel auction. I've seen another Sperati forgery pasted on a similar piece of paper with the same cancels ('DESPATCH...' and 'FREE').

Examples of other forgeries:

1846 New type, inscription "CITY DISPATCH POST 2 CENTS"

Image obtained from a Siegel auction

(Reduced size, image obtained from a Siegel auction)

  2 c red

Most likely a forgery of this stamp, 2 c in blue color and Washington facing the other direction.

1846 Inscription "U.S. MAIL PRE.PAID" in a circle

Image obtained from a Cherrystone auction

(Genuine, reduced sizes, images obtained from a Siegel auction)

Genuine stamps

1 c black on red
(Could be forgeries)

  1 c black on red
  1 c black on yellow

At least 11 different kinds of forgeries exist. I do not know if all of the above stamps are genuine.

The above stamp is probably the second forgery described in Album Weeds. There is no dot behind the "U" of "U.S.". Furthermore the letters are not positioned alike as in the genuine stamps. For example the "N" of "ONE": in the genuine stamps the first stroke of the "M" of "MAIL" is exactly above the first stroke of the this "N". And the first stroke of this "N" is above the end of the "E" of "CENT" in the genuine stamps (here it is above the center). If I'm well informed, this forgery might have been made by Scott. There seem to be slightly different types of this forgery (see the "P" of "PAID" in the above examples).

Most likely a forgery, "P" of "PAID" slanting forwards, no dot behind "U" of "U S". The letters in "MAIL" are badly done.

Another dubious stamp with the lettering very badly done.

I have my doubts about the following stamp: