The Stamps of Canada | Page 8

three pence, the
required charge for postage.
"I am, sir, your obedient servant,
"WILLIAM SMITH, Secretary."
It will be noted from the conclusion of this letter that, according to the
department at Ottawa, one might infer that the use of such a stamp
would not be irregular. This is confirmed by the following extract from
a reply to a letter a friend of mine wrote to Ottawa at my request:--
OTTAWA, March 2nd, 1904.
"I took those questions of Mr. Greenshields over to Mr. ---- of the Post
Office Department. He tells me that before the first issue of stamps,
which took place on the 23rd of April, 1851, each Postmaster had a
steel stamp which he used to mark the amount prepaid on the letter.
These stamps were of different patterns, and it is probably the
impression of one of them that appears on Mr. Greenshield's envelope.
In some of the smaller post-offices they continued to use these stamps
as late as 1875.
"It is rather a singular coincidence that if the inquiry had been,
regarding the position of Postmaster, more than one day earlier, the
Canadian records would not have shown whether the man named had
held office or not, the reason being that it was on the 6th of April, 1851,
that the Post Office Department was transferred from the Imperial
Government, and all records prior to that date are in the possession of
the Imperial authorities."

It seems strange that more of these covers have not been found. Such
well-known authorities on the stamps of British North America as Mr.
Lachlan Gibb and Mr. William Patterson, of Montreal, and Mr. Donald
A. King, of Halifax, had not seen any until I consulted them about this
one. I think it is very interesting to hear of a stamped envelope like this
being used by the Post Office just before the issue of postage stamps.
So far as we have been able to find out the above constitutes all that has
been published regarding this envelope. We can find no further mention
of it in the columns of the London Philatelist or of any other journal
published since 1904 nor does Mr. Howes so much as refer to it in his
recently published monograph on Canada's postal issues. Yet, on the
face of it, the matter seems one worthy of extended investigation by
some Canada specialist or other. Its history, as given above, is similar
in many respects to the history of many of the much sought after
Postmaster's provisional stamps of the United States and there is a
possibility that this envelope may represent a legitimate postmaster's
provisional.
CHAPTER III.
--The First Issue.
In common with the other Colonies of British North America Canada
was granted the privilege of administrating its own postal service in
1850, and in the same year an Act was passed providing for the change.
It is hardly necessary to quote this Act in full though the following
extracts are of interest:--
CAP. VII.
An Act to provide for the transfer of the management of the Inland
Posts to the Provincial Government, and for the Regulation of the said
department.
II.--And be it enacted, that the Inland Posts and Post Communications
in this Province shall, so far as may be consistent with the Acts of the
Parliament of the United Kingdom in force in this Province, be

exclusively under Provincial management and control; the revenues
arising from the duties and postage dues receivable by the officers
employed in managing such Posts and Post Communications shall form
part of the Provincial Revenue, unless such monies belong of right to
the United Kingdom, or to some other Colony, or to some Foreign State,
and the expenses of management shall be defrayed out of Provincial
Funds, and that the Act passed in the Eighth year of Her Majesty's
Reign, and entitled An Act to provide for the management of the
Customs, and of matter relative to the collection of the Provincial
Revenue, shall apply to the said Posts and Post Communications, and
to the officers and persons employed in managing the same, or in
collecting or accounting for the duties and dues aforesaid, except in so
far as any provision of the said Act may be insusceptible of such
application, or may be inconsistent with any provision of this Act.
VIII.--And in conformity to the agreement made as aforesaid between
the Local Governments of the several Colonies of British North
America, be it enacted that the Provincial Postage on letters and
packets not being newspapers, printed pamphlets, magazines or books,
entitled to pass at a lower rate, shall not exceed Threepence currency
per half-ounce, for any distance whatsoever within this Province, any
fraction of a half-ounce being chargeable as a half-ounce; that no transit
postage shall be charged