Queensland Catalog of Receiving Office Manuscripts on Postage Stamps by Dr Jeremy Hodes: Fairymead

Sunday 4 October 2015

Fairymead

Fairymead receiving office, a sugar plantation 9 km north of Bundaberg. The Fairymead Plantation Receiving Office opened in 1894 and the name was shortened to Fairymead in about 1898. It was elevated to a post office in about September 1911. The receiving office keeper in 1894 was J. McIvor; 1901 S. Luke; 1903 S. Ford and 1905 T Neilson

Oval Rubber cancellation dated 1901 - 1909 rated Very Rare

Fairymead date stamp cancel HERE

Fairymead oval rubber cancellation in violet dated 21 January 1904 with a Bundaberg duplex numeral 148 cancellation of the same date and rated Very Rare. Seen at Premier Postal auction no 110

Fairymead oval rubber cancellation in violet dated 5 January 1909 with a partial Bundaberg duplex numeral 148 cancellation and rated Very Rare. Seen at Abacus auction no 234 lot no 688

Fairymead oval rubber cancellation in violet dated 19 December 1901 with a Bundaberg duplex numeral 148 cancellation of the same date and rated Very Rare. Seen in a private collection

No comments:

Post a Comment

Subscribe to: Post Comments (Atom)

A blog listing the different Queensland receiving office manuscript cancellations found on Queensland (Chalon, Sideface and Commonwealth) postage stamps. To find the receiving office you are looking for select from the alphabetical tabs above or the labels below

While hundreds of receiving offices existed for various lengths of time, almost all did not use distinctly recognisable markings. Most receiving offices followed the instructions of either not cancelling the stamp but letting the first "Official" Post Office that the mail arrived at do this, or they followed a later instruction to write the receiving offices' name on the envelope or postcard near the stamp. To see this you would need the envelope or postcard.

However, if the letter was a "local" mail, that is used in the same town / area, then this did have to be cancelled. This is where most of the crosses, names and initials come from. Occasionally these markings were also applied to mail destined for other areas.

All identifiable manuscript cancellations are therefore extremely scarce and hard to find, with the possible exceptions of Cania, Mt Larcom, Parson's Point and San Jose.

The rarity rating, given this caveat, is Scarce, for the most commonly found cancels, Rare, and then Very Rare where only 1 or two examples have been seen by me. All covers and postcards (with the possible exception of Parson's Point) are extremely rare and desirable.

Information about the receiving offices comes from Joan Frew: Queensland Post Offices 1842-1980 and Receiving Offices 1869-1927, published in 1981

You can contact me on jeremy2929@gmail.com

Copyright Dr Jeremy Hodes 2023 for content and my images. Copyright for all other images and auction text descriptions rests with the organisations and individuals listed at the image level