The Crowned Oval Date Stamps of Victoria 1839−1866: Pre-publication Offer

Description

“The Crowned Oval Date Stamps of Victoria 1839−1866” by Robert Hillman is the twenty-fifth publication of the J.R.W. Purves Memorial Series. Those with an interest in the early postal history of Victoria may well have encountered Crowned Oval date stamps and wondered about their history and usage. Through painstaking archival research over many years, virtually all the crowned oval date stamps have been identified, as well as the associated markings. The resulting work runs to 220 pages with an exhaustive illustrated alphabetical compilation backed-up by 12 appendices including Route Maps.

There were considerable changes to postal arrangements in Victoria in the 20 years between 1840 and 1860. The first post offices were extensions of the postal administration in New South Wales and the date stamps reflected this with the office names along the top and a form of ‘New South Wales’ along the bottom. These were large date stamps and, not surprisingly, similar to the crowned ovals being used in New South Wales. New offices opened and the ‘NSW’ was replaced with Port Phillip as this district was now defined. All crowned oval date stamps were once again altered when Victoria became a separate colony.

By this time, stamps had been introduced and all of the implements to obliterate stamps came into being, beginning with the ‘butterfly’ cancellations, followed a couple of years later with the ‘barred oval’ cancellations and again three years later with the ‘barred numeral’ cancellations. Offices were also issued ‘PAID’ markings, ‘MISSENT’ markings and some offices ‘TOO LATE’ markings.
The backdrop to these many postal changes was the discovery of gold in Victoria. Communities seemed to appear overnight and sometimes disappeared just as quickly. The demand for post offices in these areas meant new offices were established regularly across Victoria, but particularly in the gold-field areas. Postmasters came and went; offices opened, closed and opened again. Names of offices changed and specifically, at the beginning of 1854, no fewer than 25 offices officially changed their names and thus new date stamps had to be issued.
This book combines and extends the earlier work done by Bill Purves, and later Hugh Freeman and Geoff White cataloguing and clarifying the postal markings of this fascinating period with the emphasis on those large decorative crown oval date stamps. There are over 200 of these, both large crowned ovals and smaller crowned ovals, identified and recorded with detailed information and images. By the end of 1865, all crowned ovals had been replaced, usually by oval cancellations without a crown and with removeable year plugs.
So the wonderful Crowned Ovals were relegated to history and to this book.

Limited Pre-publication Offer
The Society is pleased to offer, “The Crowned Oval Date Stamps of Victoria 1839−1866” by Robert Hillman at the special pre-publication price of A$100 for orders received before 15 September 2024. (The full price will be A$120.) Postage and packing will be A$18.25 within Australia. Pick-up at nominated RPSV day & evening meetings will be also possible. Please request quotation for overseas airmail postage.