Cape of Good Hope Squared Circle Datestamp (Cape Town) - 1882
The Squared Circle Datestamp
The Squared Circle Datestamp was based on a successful British design of 1879. More than any of the other experimental datestamps, it was a formidable obliterator of postage stamps in the first instance and a decent datestamp in the second. It fulfilled the Cape Post Office's need for a time-saving one strike obliterator and datestamp and was ultimately approved for distribition to some 60 Cape POs.
The Cape Post Office initially issued Cape Town with two experimental Squared Circle Datestamps, one for the GPO CAPE TOWN with 'CAPE COLONY' at base and another for CAPE TOWN with 'CAPE COLONY' at base. These two were slightly different to each other. CAPE TOWN was [1+4] (one circle, four arcs) and the GPO CAPE TOWN was [1+3] (one circle, three arcs). Other post offices participating in the experiment received [1+4] Squared Circle Datestamps.
Notwithstanding the long-serving and hard-working GPO CAPE TOWN [1+3], the bulk of all experimental cancelling in the early years of the trial was made with [1+4] CAPE COLONY datestamps. From time to time, new experimental Squared Circle Datestamps were introduced into the trial. This can be seen from the cover below which offers clear proof that Cape Town received a second experimental CAPE TOWN CAPE COLONY Squared Circle Datestamp, this time a [1+3]. Its date of 1886, places it well within the experimental period, 1882 - 1891. It is possibly unrecorded.
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Steve, I have been slow in responding to this, as I am confused as everyone else, and wanted to do some more sorting. Some questions before I post some from my own studies.
1.0 When one says 1+3 or 1+4 do you count the last sort of triangular point or only the arcs?
2.0 Do you or Bob Hill has any G.P.O. Early usage?
The attachment is the earliest cover I have SQC.CC datestamped JY 4 1882. Bob Hill's piece you show is probably the earliest on a stamp! Aab on his website shows a stamp dated AUG 14 83 and no covers.
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Yannis, time flies and memory flutters away. I was horrified on coming back to this post and re-reading it. Was I confused or what? Then I re-read it (twice!) and it seemed to make sense except for the bit where I say that Bob's piece is a '1+4'. It certainly does not look like it! I can only see '1+3'. So, I am wondering if I deferred to conventional wisdom here rather than the evidence before my eyes. I find that statement of mine perplexing! However, by all accounts the first CAPE TOWN CAPE COLONY SqC was '1+4', (as shown by Putzel).
- Yes, when I say '1+3', I include the outer triangular tip as one of the arcs. So your cover above is 1+4 (one circle, four arcs).
- Possibly, I will have to look and have a word with Bob. At this moment, let's assume not.
As to dates, I cannot comment. Franco Frescura cites 25 January 82 which is the date on the postmark shown in Putzel's Vol. 2. This must have been extracted from a cover or a piece, making it the oldest example?
Putzel shows two different GPO CAPE TOWN CAPE COLONY SqCs from '91 and '95, hardly the experimental period. Both of these are '1+3' SqCs, the difference is in the size of their outer letters.
I think it would be quite an achievement if we could bring clarity to this subject. Right now, I remain confused.
Steve
Bob Hill needs to come to the rescue!
EARLY ISSUE
- The cover I showed is the earliest cover I have. Not necessarily the Earliest Recorded Date. (Would love to see Putzel's scan).
- I dont' have much between 1882-1888 or they have been displaced and I cannot find them. I am a very untidy collector.
LATER REISSUE? OR RE-APPEARANCE
- The SC.CC re-appeared again probably in 1893 (just after the Compass Wheel).
- I have many covers covering 1894, 1895 and 1896 demonstrating use during these years.
WITH CGH AT BOTTOM
- The SC.GGH appeared only in 1898! I think one should extend the experimental period to either 1898 or 1899 if one wants to include the machine canceller trial of 1899 as well.
Personally I prefer a plot of usage rather than ERD and LRD as especially the Last Recorded Dates can be just an incident when the Post Office had a surge of mail and just re-introduced the datestamp for a short time.
Example (unfinished) shown in the attachment. I will record with an 'x' the months I have or seen based on what is posted here or available elsewhere to confirm it.
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Here's a page from Ralph Putzel's "The Postmarks of South Africa and Former States & Colonies". This shows his listing for some of the 'Experimental' datestamps. See the top Sqc for the 'JA 25 92' date which is also quoted by Frescura.
I have spoken to Bob who says he will have a look to see what he has.
I have always assumed (ASS-U-ME) that the SqC with CGH at base came in as an accepted datestamp ie. the experiment to choose a new datestamp resulted in many POs receiving the SqC with CGH at base. As such, the SqCs with CGH at the base were not a part of the experiment but rather the fruit of it. Yes / No?
I can get 10+ covers from outside Cape Town with SqCs with CGH at the base. I can scan these and post them as a page of SqC postmarks if you think this will be helpful. Or are we still concentrating only on Cape Town?
I like your example. It is very neat. I am sure that I and other SAPC members could contribute scans or dates to you as we find them. Please confirm that this is for Cape Town SqCs only.
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Steve is right. Looks like 1+3 but as he says, conventional wisdom (Putzel and Frescura) say it must be 1+4 - at that date! Below is a GPO CAPE TOWN CAPE COLONY datestamp on a pair of 6d stamps. The date is not as shown in the squared circle on left but is JY 24 85, I think. (Year unclear, may be '95. Will check the watermark and advise.) Have a number of these from all over. Happy to share with you and the club! The last is not special.
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Steve
Thanks for your quick response. The Putzel scan is very useful and confirms my own suspicions.
- The scan in Frescura as well as Putzel is probably from Baden's paper as quoted in Frescura, hence from a "blue book"?
- I am still not sure if the "experiment" ever ended. I personally think it ended with the arrival of the double circle. A circular canceller met all the requirements. But the observation is correct that the rest of the Towns were issued with CGH at the bottom.
- I think for the time being we should keep the thread limited to Cape Town, so we don't confuse the issue more. Once we have some more concrete results, we can then post some from other towns.
- I have similar charts for the other experimental datestamps as well (only for Cape Town). This is my attempt to make some sense out of them. Some run concurrently and others didn't.
- The duplexes have similar issues with dating them and it appears they were also sometimes disassembled and the two pieces used separately.
- Steve on your earliest post you mentioned Putzel's 57x as dated 1891. I looked at it carefully as I could not find any example of this earlier than 1894 and it is certainly 1894. Frescura maybe also misread the date as he wrote ... there followed a lapse of about seven or eight years, during which time no further examples of this canceller type were made available until about 1891, when a second Square Circle, this time with the letters CGH at its base (SQC.CGH) was distributed.
Any help from anyone is appreciated.
Quote from Underbidder on October 23, 2020, 5:43 pmSteve is right. Looks like 1+3 but as he says, conventional wisdom (Putzel and Frescura) say it must be 1+4 - at that date! Below is a GPO CAPE TOWN CAPE COLONY datestamp on a pair of 6d stamps. The date is not as shown in the squared circle on left but is JY 24 85, I think. (Year unclear, may be '95. Will check the watermark and advise.) Have a number of these from all over. Happy to share with you and the club! The last is not special.
Thanks for posting your example. I think there was a second datestamp 1+3 when it was issued I am not too sure. I follow Steve's suggestion counting the edge as one. I have 2 similar from 1886 and 1887. They definitely look very different from the 1882. Am I missing something?
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Well-spotted. You are right - I am wrong about Putzel's 57x. It is '94', not '91'. I apologise for my serious failing in this regard. I must now take some small measure of satisfaction in sending you that page - and that you looked at it!
It would seem that your two '1+3' CT CC SqCs above are the same as my initial offereing. They are from the same period 1886/87. So, in the absence of Putzel, Frescura and Visser listing these - I find that hard to believe - Bob's, mine and your two are unrecorded examples. Just to make sure I went to Alex Visser's on-line Addendum where I found nothing new about a '1+3' CT CC SqC. If these are unrecorded, and it would appear so, then this is a good start towards unravelling some of the mystery and contradictions of these datestamps.
I did find the following on Alex's Addendum which I add here as it claims to be a small '1+3' GPO CT CGH Sqc. As it shows little detail of the outer SqC, it is not particularly helpful and brings little to the party.
If you do not have the link to Alex's Addedum, here it is: http://linus.up.ac.za/academic/civil/books/
This Addendum lists 'new finds' not listed in Ralph Putzel's and Alex Visser's ten volumes of "The Postmarks of SA..." It is only really useful if you have that South African postmark reference set and cannot find a postmark in it. As Alex's Addendum is now almost the size of the original ten volumes, the chances are good that between the original books and the on-line Addendum you will find your postmark recorded. But not, it would appear, if it is a '1+3' CT CC Sqc!
If we are correct that the '1+3' CT CC SqC is unrecorded, the reason they remain unlisted must be because of the general fog of confusion surrounding these datestamps. I stress again, it is now time to sort this lot out.
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Thanks for the additional info. I agree with you that this is now time to sort this lot out. I have managed to find most of my covers with square circle cancellations and started writing them up. I am writing them up chronologically, so hopefully in a couple of days we might have a clearer picture.
So far I have a very clear picture as to what happened with their re-appearance at least between 1894-1899.