Specimen Stamps of the Crown Colonies 1857-1948

Green boards with gilt blocked titles to upper board and to spine titles.

The simplest definition of a specimen stamp in philatelic terms is as follows. A stamp or stamp proof which has been provided or preserved as a sample, for which no payment has been made to the revenue, and whch has been defaced to prevent its postal (or fiscal) use. For the Crown Colonies such defacement generally took the form of a 'SPECIMEN' overprint or perforation. Early uncancelled stamps and a few later which were used as specimens can only be distinguished as such if they remain in official collections or if they are still attached to documents which proclaim them to be specimens. The following generalizations hold good.

Stamps issued before June 1884 which have been printed or well-impressed 'SPECIMEN' or CANCELLED' overprints, which are found on the stamps of a number of different territories, are generally printers' reference copies not necessarily taken from the first printings. Those with cruder 'SPECIMEN' handstamps, found on the stamps of one territory only, generally locally overprinted, are believed mostly to have been used to provide presentation sets. Nearly all the specimen stamps of the Crown Colonies of this period are rare to very rare. Many of those which have come on to the market will be found to have some clipped perforations, owing to them having been seperated by scissor-minded bureaucrats, and they will often be short of gum, owing to their having been stuck down in reference collections.

This work is recognised as a standard definitive volume on the subject and sought after.

Half Title, Title, Author's Preface, Note by the Publications Committee, Contents.255 pages text with supporting photographic examples and illustrations, tables etc.

Fine.

ISBN  0 900631 08 3