4d Chalon Re-entry Varieties

[Jerry Weirich]

A great 4d Chalon watermarked star block of 4 (pictured below) sold on eBay last week for about 274 Pounds. I was unfortunately not the lucky winner. I do, however, think the block is worth documenting here because the top right stamp is an excellent example of one of the major reentry varieties from Position 6 of the sheet.

4d Chalon block with reentry variety.JPG (69.2 KiB) Viewed 7719 times

I have also scanned a second example of the stamp watermarked star with an enlargement of the reentry showing a line through FOUR PENCE and a line below the stamp.

Pos 6 full stamp.jpg (73.42 KiB) Viewed 7719 times

Pos 6 enlargement.jpg (35.56 KiB) Viewed 7719 times

There are additional reentry varieties on the 4d Chalon and they make great additions to a Chalon collection.

[songenaz]

I just discover the web site today
Even your post is quite old , I have a question: You say it's position 6
Is there a plating of chalon Heads?
For different value( 1 penny, 2 Pence and Four pence)?
is it the same plate for different issue ( Star Watermark, No Watermark and double line Watermark) ?
For double line watermark, was it the same plate for different printers ( Best , Davies and Government printing)
Where can I get all these informations?
Many thanks for reply
Regards
Laurent

[Malcolm Groom]

Laurent,

There are two good articles in the London Philatelist written by O.G Ingles on the printing of the 1d and 4d Chalons which were all from the Perkins Bacon plates which were sent to Tasmania. I will try and find my copies of these articles.

Meanwhile there was a small article published in PJGB many years ago which I attach.

Malcolm

PJGB 4d reentries.pdf

(1.63 MiB) Downloaded 366 times

[Malcolm Groom]

Laurent,

Here is the OG Ingles article from the 1981 London Philatelist on the 2d Chalon. He has never managed to complete the article on the 1d value.

Malcolm

2d Chalon Ingles LP1065.pdf

(5.5 MiB) Downloaded 471 times

[Malcolm Groom]

Laurent,

The Ingles article on the 4d Chalon is attached from the London Philatelist


Malcolm

4d Chalon Ingles LP1061.pdf

(5.56 MiB) Downloaded 450 times

[songenaz]

Malcolm,

Many thanks for such important information.
I have to work a bit on these articles and I 'll go back to you for further questions.
But one already: I saw a post about error on 4 D Chalons as : "Van DIFMENS LAND"
I have an example with last part of first N Missing.
Do you know if it's regular plate flaw or just something strange on my stamp.
I have to understand how to put picture on my post and I will send you picture of this stamp
Many thanks again

Laurent

[Jerry Weirich]

Hi Laurent. Welcome to the Bulletin Board!

You asked about plating the Chalons. I used Tinsley's book "Stamps and Postal History of Tasmania," 1986, for identifying the reentry of position 6. The book is not a comprehensive study and only discusses four reentry varieties on five stamps (positions 6, 20, 26, 209, and 221). It does show more examples of the roller flaws.

Regards, Jerry

[songenaz]

Hello Jerry
Many thanks for this information
I try to find this Tinsley's book at the moment, maybe soon...
i just wondering how many position in a sheet. On the last Feldman's auction, there was a lot of 4d star watermark with different position, one of those was 240. Is there more?
How did Mr Sato-san find these different position?
Thanks again
regards
laurent

[admin]

The Perkins Bacon plates were sent from London ( in error according to Basset Hull, which Perkins Bacon regretted as they lost the possibility of producing stamps on an on-going basis for Tasmania after the initial batch) to Tasmania in 1856 for the Chalon issues.
Perkins Bacon provided an initial batch of stamps and then the plates were used to produce stamps locally.
The plates were 20 rows of 12 stamps for the 1d, 2d and 4d, and similar for the later 6d and 1/-, though the 6d and 1/- were better spaced to allow for better perforation. Perkins Bacon did not perforate stamps at this time and did not allow a sufficiently wide margin in their plate layout around the first Chalon issues for satisfactory perforation.
The total printings by Best in 1857 on numeral watermark paper were from the Perkins and Bacon plates which had by then arrived in Tasmania, as were the earlier no-water mark and pelure paper issues.
After Best’s printings, John Davis took over the job or printing the stamps in 1859, then Birchal and also Hood printed more in 1863 . The Government Printing office took over printing in 1864.
There were of course a range of local perforations produces at various times in various places in Tasmania.

William Purves, the great early researcher of Tasmanian philately has written about Roller Flaws of the 2d and 4d Perkins Bacon plates in “Philately from Australia” vol 9 no 2 June 1957 p36. There are also a number of other articles scattered around various Journals on various aspects of the Perkins Bacon plates. I imagine Tinsley obtained some of his information from Purves but I don’t have the Purves article so cannot be sure if there is anything there not in Tinsley.

I have made a search of the McNamee Biblography for Tasmania and don’t see anything else about flaws on the Chalons. I suspect not much more research has been done(?)

The above information has been extracted from Basset Hull, Tinsley ( thouhg there is quite a bit more detail in those works) and the McNamee Bibliography.
It would be good if someone was keen enough to pull the scattered information on this topic together and do some contemporary research to see if there is anything more to be learned and the plate flaws and other related matters for these very interesting issues. Owen Ingles work should also be included
If anyone has any further information, others would be very grateful to hear about it.

Pete

[Jerry Weirich]

Thanks Pete. I was just getting to respond myself, but you've covered the topic. There is one typo in your response. As you indicated, all the Chalon values were printed in sheets of 240 stamps but in 20 (not 24) rows of 12 stamps.

Laurent -- I am not aware of any comprehensive plating study on any of the Chalon values. If you are interested in plating them and want to undertake a study, I would be happy to send you scans of all my multiples (which is not many). Jerry

[songenaz]

Hi Jerry, Hi everybody
Many thanks for your message
in fact, plating is my favourite way of thinking philately, even I have also interest on postal history.
for more than 20 years I did a large work on well known 25 Cents ceres 1871-1875. French blue stamps with a lot of study...
In the last 10 years, I worked a lot on really specific part, bottom of sheet A2, what we call " grande cassure" aka big brake, an amazing problem during 3 years which made so many different varieties.
For this study, I'm looking for rare block proving life at the same time of different state.

Yes I would be interesting on doing that, but I have to check first few information about the plate and the way to produce these stamps.
People say, there's not so many stamps for tasmania.
Then maybe it's not possible... But we can have a try.
thanks for your help, I would be happy to ask about your scan of mutiples. I have already few, but I think that we need a lot to find success
best regards
laurent

[admin]

Firstly, Gerry, thanks for picking up that error regarding the number of rows on the plate. I have amended '24' to read '20' .

Secondly, Laurent, if you have trouble finding information about the process for making the Perkins Bacon plates, let me know as there is quite a bit of detail available.
I assume the 25c 1871 Ceres were produced by typgraphy/letterpress. You probably know Perkins Bacon used plates with the image in intaglio ( sometimes called 'engraved' ) but whatever the name, the image is sunk into the steel and the ink sits below the surface of the plate in the lines which have been engraved, rather than on a raised surfaces used in typography which is the case with many French stamps ( as I understand it). The Perkins Bacon process allows for finer lines and also different shading as the ink is deposited in different amounts according to how deep the line is engraved into the plate. You can get very nice stamps this way as there can be more detail and better shading of the image but it costs 10 times as much as typography.

There was no electrotyping to transfer the die images to the printing plate. The original die is pressed into a wheel which holds a number of images of the die, and then the wheel - called a transfer roller - is rolled into the surface of the plate pushing the images of the die into the softened steel plate. If anyone is interested in the detail of this process I have a few pages from a book by Fred Melville which fully explains the procedure. I can post a pdf of the relevant pages here - if anyone is interested let me know.

Finally, there are some quite large blocks of the 4d imperf lined numeral Chalon around that have appeared at auction in recent years. I have a few scans in auction catalogues. Perhaps its possible to find some images. What level of detail is required to work on the plating?

[Malcolm Groom]

I have located the article in the June 1957 Philately from Australia written by Bill Purves where he explains the plating of the re-entries and roller flaws found in the 2d and 4d Chalons. These appear to have been plated by using the reprint sheets of both values. Sadly this makes the 'plating' simple as they are found in full sheets. A plating of the London and later colonial printings would still be an enthralling challenge. Plenty of fiscally used examples of 1d and 4d which are readily obtainable would assist and be easier on the pocket than the star wmk London printings
An extract from the P form A is attached.

4d Chalon plating P from A 1957.pdf

(677.77 KiB) Downloaded 352 times

[songenaz]

Hello Pete
Yes I will be really interested about the process of Perkins bacon printing.
if you can set the pdf on the board, it will be great
Main question, I think, is :
Do you think every issue of chalons heads printing is coming from the same die , same plate.
For plating a stamp you need a lot of pair, band, bloc .
If we can use every different issue it could work.
It looks that the first two printings as No watermark and star watermatk issue looks definitely more precise than the double line watermark
Does it means that printing in Hobart was made different?
For scanning stamps, let's try 600 Dpi as some small details are really important.
Pete and Jerry, if you want to have a try on scannig stamps, it will be great
Many thanks
laurent

[songenaz]

Hello Malcolm!
Great!
What a really good helpfull information.
Few years ago I spent somme hours on the fist stamp of danemark, the 2 Rigsbanskilling 1851_1852
there was 10 major types. from that point it' s easy to find small difference between stamps.
If we can confirm the same way of thinking, we can avoid the main problem who is to find vertical link ( vertical pair or bloc of four)
I will start to try this afternoon with few paitr I have and let you know.
Many thanks again
laurent

[admin]

Hello Pete
...
Main question, I think, is :
Do you think every issue of chalons heads printing is coming from the same die , same plate.
For plating a stamp you need a lot of pair, band, bloc .
If we can use every different issue it could work.
It looks that the first two printings as No watermark and star watermatk issue looks definitely more precise than the double line watermark
Does it means that printing in Hobart was made different?
...
laurent

Laurent, there were three different dies one each for the 1d, 2, and 4d. The plates from these were sent to Tasmania along with a quantity of stamps on the star watermark paper.
So, the star watermark issues were made in London by Perkins Bacon. When these ran out, Best( the printer of the 'Courier issues of 1853) made some 'emergency' printings in Hobart using the Perkins Bacon plates, on un-watermarked paper and also the 1d on the pelure paper. For the Lined Numeral printings, these were made in Hobart by a number of different printers but always using the same plates and different paper than the star watermark paper but still supplied by Perkins Bacon.
I believe it was the same for the 6d and 1/- that is, all printings were made from the one set of plates, and initial printings made in London with later printings made in Hobart. All the dies and the rollers for all 5 values were sent to Tasmania in 1862 but I dont think any more plates were made in Hobart. I am no expert on this subject and others may have some corrections to offer.

I'm not quite sure why some printings look clearer than others. To my mind the 4d Star watermark look the clearest. The no-watermak printings look a little washed out and less clear to me and I have assumed this may be more to do with the paper( it was sourced locally and likely to not be of the same quality as the star watermark paper. Perkins Bacon had considerable experience in producing paper suitable for their printing process).
The quality of the paper and how absorbent it is will have some affect on the sharpness of the printing. If the ink is absorbed into the paper and spreads slightly then the effect will be less sharp. If the ink stays on the surface and does not spread the stamp might look sharper. As I believe the same plates were used right through my assumption is the variation in sharpness of the appearance of the stamps is due to differences in the paper, ink, and/or perhaps the skill of the printer in inking the plates as well.
This is my own opinion. I dont recall seeing any discussions regarding the different qualities of the various printings.
You will find quite a lot of useful information in Tinsley on the printings, and also in Basset Hull. I'll put the relevant chapter from Basset Hull on our website in the Members area in a day or two and leave a note here when its on-line.

Pete

[admin]

Perkins Bacon Printing process ( as used to produce early stamps) & Chap 3 of Basset Hull now on TPS Members site.
This is a chapter from the revised and up-dated book by Fred Melville 1948. While its quite old, it does present a clear and detailed explanation of the original Perkins Bacon process for producing engraved ( intaglio) stamps as used for the Chalons . The file is rather large so has been split into 2 parts

Perkins-Bacon Printing- Melville part 1.pdf

(2.57 MiB) Downloaded 326 times

Perkins-Bacon Printing- Melville part 2.pdf

(2.46 MiB) Downloaded 354 times

I have also up-loaded Chap 3 from Basset Hull, Stamps of Tasmania, onto the members area of the tps website. This covers the stamps from 1855 to 1857 and has much information . I will add the following two chapter which covers the rest of the Chalon issues as soon as I have time. Members can access this and download it but will need their members' password. Contact me if you are not sure what the password is.
Pete

[Malcolm Groom]

Laurent,

Here also is the article from the London Philatelist which gives more information and to which the illustrations in P from A relate.

Regards

Malcolm

Perkins Bacon flaws on 2d & 4d Purves.pdf

(1.47 MiB) Downloaded 426 times

[songenaz]

Hello everybody
many thanks for all these information
This evening in less than half an hour I found almost the place of a strip of three of 4d chalon star watermark
Roller flaw number 10 and only number 10, means it's between 145 and 156.
I hope if we find enough material it would be possible step by step to try to plate 4d chalon.
Much easier i Think wit star watermark or no watermark issue.
As soon as I understand how to put stamps on the board I will share picture s with you
Best regards
laurent

Here is Laurent's image (Admin)

Numériser0001.jpg (349.28 KiB) Viewed 7270 times

[admin]

I have just added Laurent's image of the star wm 4d strip to his post.
Sadly I think its probably impossible to find enough no-watermark material and very difficult even with star watermark stamps to find enough for plating. Perhaps the star watermark issue could be plated with enough time? Any other views?

[bill]

Since the one set of plates for 1d, 2d, 4d, 6d and 1/- were
used for printing all the Chalons, it would be easier to seek
stamps on numeral watermarked paper so as to reduce the
financial burden. Chalons with star watermark or on paper
without watermark (emergency printings by Best) are quite
expensive, especially the 1d and 2d.

FIscally used examples on numeral paper do not have much
of the design obscured by the pen cancellations, unlike the
postally cancelled stamps with numerals inside barred oval
postmarks that are often found. The 2d may be somewhat
hard to obtain fiscally used in quantity but other values are
not so hard to find fiscally used.

Thus, you get to see nearly all of the design, including those
long-sought flaws.

Bill