tps.org.au

The Craig & Ingles catalogue listed a 2/6 Dragon overprinted REVENUE with watermark
double-lined '1' as No. 30. This item was previously listed in Forbin's catalogue (1910)
as No. 22. Morley's catalogue also listed this item. Craig & Ingles cannot be criticised
for listing this item, given that the recognised authorities from earlier times said that
such a stamp had been recorded. After all, it might exist in someone's collection.

Now that I have seen some pages on Tasmanian issues in the A B Kay catalogue (1908),
it becomes clear that the 2/6 Dragon watermarked 1 as recorded there actually bore
a REVENUE overprint 2 mm high rather than 1½ mm as used from November 1900 for
all other stamps overprinted REVENUE. That detail about the overprint is missing in
both Morley's and Forbin's catalogues. The only example of an overprint 2 mm high
listed in Craig & Ingles is No. 35, a 2/6 Dragon watermarked double-lined 4.

The July 1913 issue of the Bulletin of the Fiscal Philatelic Society quoted a report by
Mr A. White of Tasmania that the alleged '1' is really a '4'. It is very easy to make an
error like this in a cursory examination of the watermark. Of course, other Dragon
stamps have either a double-lined 1 or the second type TAS as the watermark. We
can now see how the erroneous report arose in the early literature. No example
has ever been seen in recent times.

So we can confidently assert that the listing of No. 30 by Craig & Ingles is an error
as we now know in hindsight. Nevertheless, the Craig & Ingles catalogue is a very
good catalogue of the revenue and railway stamps with very few major oversights.
In passing, it seems that the A B Kay catalogue is hard to locate these days.

It pays to take care in examining the watermark as surprises can sometimes occur.

This Mr A. White is mentioned several times in the Bulletin of the Fiscal Philatelic
Society but little is known about him. There is no mention of him in The Courier's
recent history as published in No. 70. Is it possible that he lived in Launceston or
somewhere else in the northern parts of Tasmania?

Bill

A good example of 'do your own research'. When these people parrot incorrect information judges at exhibitions can penalise an exhibitor for not say showing this 1 wmk. ozrevenues.com has never listed this wmk.

Dave

This case of the alleged 2/6 overprinted REVENUE wmk '1' is an instance where the published
research was incomplete in at least two ways. Firstly, the wmk was wrongly recorded as '1',
not '4' as should have occurred. Secondly, the height was actually 2 mm, not 1.5 mm. That
omission is misleading as it led to a non-existent variety being catalogued for over 100 years
in the literature.

Clearly, it pays to check every report in the literature, including hard-to-find sources. This
is easier said than done. Kay's catalogue is not easy to locate.