Experimental Duplex Scotland

EXPERIMENTAL DUPLEX CANCELLATIONS OF SCOTLAND

The huge increase in the volume of post during the early 1850’s focused the minds of the Postal Authorities on ways to speed up the mail procedures whilst keeping the costs to a minimum.

At the time, the procedure was for the dispatch office to apply a killer cancellation (which contained a numeral representing the dispatch office) to the postage stamp and then an additional datestamp to the reverse of the letter.

Today it would seem quite logical to combine both the canceller and the datestamp but in the mid 19th Century this decision was not quite so clear cut; the added weight of the combined cancelling stamp would undoubtedly slow down the procedure as well as potentially damaging the envelope.

The use of a Duplex stamp, which was a single piece of metal incorporating both cancelling and dating elements commenced in 1853 in England and Wales; the so-called ‘Spoon Experiment’.

This experiment was considered successful but it was two years before the principles were copied in Scotland with the Experimental Duplex dies being manufactured by Alexander Kirkwood and Son of Edinburgh.

As will be seen, many of the Experimental cancels were very similar to the Double marks (separate date and canceller dies) that were subsequently adopted by the Scottish Postal Authorities from 1857 onwards although some of the Experimental marks continued additionally to be in use for a number of years thereafter (see relevant LKD).

However, one of the significant differences between some of these Experimental marks and the later adopted marks is that the former has short horizontal lines on one or both sides of the numeral whereas these are absent in the later adopted Duplex marks.

I would draw reader’s attention to the Dundee and Glasgow (Madeleine Smith) marks where a significant new research has been documented (thanks to Mike Raguin).

The Scottish offices which participated in the Experiment were:

( Click office to view)