Robert A. Siegel Auction Galleries, Inc.

FINE. THE FINER OF TWO RECORDED COVERS WITH A PAIR OF THE HARTFORD MAIL ROUTE STAMP. AN OUTSTANDING INDEPENDENT MAIL USAGE.

According to published research by Francis E. Stern (Collectors Club Philatelist, Vol. 41, No. 3), the Hartford Mail stamps were prepared by E. W. Parsons and a partner named Fuller. Parsons was a Hartford bookseller who later became the New England superintendent for Adams Express Company and then a prominent figure in the Hartford insurance business. Mr. Fuller was an agent for Thompson & Co.'s express in Springfield Mass. The apparent function of the Parsons-Fuller Hartford Mail was to carry mail between Hartford and other cities. They also linked with other inter-city expresses that served the region, such as Adams and Hale. The more than 60 surviving covers indicate that the Hartford Mail did not deliver mail between correspondents within the city. The operation commenced in 1844 -- the earliest known cover dates from August 1844 -- and it appears to have discontinued service on June 30, 1845, the latest recorded date and the point when inter-city letter expresses were outlawed.

The stamps were printed from an engraved copper plate of 12 subjects, each different in its details. Glazed paper was used, in Yellow for 5c stamps and Pink for 10c stamps. Some believe that a third Buff-colored paper was used, others believe that the Buff paper is chemically changed. In an 1895 interview with E. W. Parsons, reported by W. H. Bruce in The Eastern Philatelist, the design of a giant mail-carrier stepping across hemispheres was derived from a Shakespearian metaphor, which Stern cited in Julius Caesar, Act 1, Scene II: Cassius speaks "Why, man, he doth bestride the narrow world, Like a Colossus, and we petty men, Walk under his huge legs, and peep about, To find ourselves dishonourable graves." Shakespeare or not, the more relevant message is that the Hartford Mail express carrier would deliver mail faster than the government.

One other pair on cover is known to us. It is also a vertical pair from Positions 1/7, cut into at left and creased across both stamps from a file fold. Each stamp has the manuscript "South" direction designation (applied before use) and a "Nov 19" cancellation. The pair is used on an 1844 folded letter to Clark & Coleman, New York City, ex Stern. Whether the ex-Stern cover or the cover offered here is the same as the Ferrary pair on cover, we cannot say, because there was no illustration in the Ferrary catalogue.

This cover is a late usage, just five days before the Hartford Mail and other inter-city expresses were declared illegal. It is also unusual in that the pair does not have the manuscript directional marking, and the red "Paid" straightline is infrequently found on Hartford Mail covers. The "Paid 2" notation at upper left confirms that two rates were paid.

Ex Boker. (Image)

VERY FINE. A VERY RARE EXAMPLE OF THE HARTFORD MAIL STAMP WITH "HARTFORD" MANUSCRIPT OVERPRINT APPLIED BEFORE MAILING.

Of the various manuscript overprints applied to sheets of the Hartford Mail stamp -- East, West, South (the most common) or Southern, and Hartford -- the last is quite rare. These overprints match the direction of the covers on which they are found, and, in the case of "Hartford", indicate the origin point. (Image)