Nigerian Stamps and Postal History

Today's post continues my detailed exploration of the stamps of the 1882-1884 Crown CA keyplate issue of Lagos, that was in use briefly until the colony decided to comply with the colour regulations of the Universal Postal Union. Today, I will look at the 2d blue. As I stated in my last post, Ince did not provide a detailed list of printings in his works. Because of that, coupled with the lack of dated postmarks in this period, it is not possible to definitively assign specific printings to specific dates. We do know that at this time that the colony was on the quarterly supply system with the crown agents. This means that there were shipments of stamps to the colony each and every month as they were needed. Now, this does not mean that there was a shipment of every value each quarter - only as supplies were exhausted. Historically, the 2d was only included with every second shipment until 1876, but after 1876, it was included with every shipment. The local letter rate was raise...

Today's post begins our detailed exploration of the stamps of the 1882-1884 Crown CA keyplate issue of Lagos, that was in use briefly until the colony decided to comply with the colour regulations of the Universal Postal Union. As I stated in my last post, Ince did not provide a detailed list of printings in his works. Because of that, coupled with the lack of dated postmarks in this period, it is not possible to definitively assign specific printings to specific dates. We do know that at this time that the colony was on the quarterly supply system with the crown agents. This means that there were shipments of stamps to the colony each and every month as they were needed. Now, this does not mean that there was a shipment of every value each quarter - only as supplies were exhausted. Historically, the 1d was included with almost every shipment. However, this was because the local postage rate was 1d per half-ounce. However, the local letter rate was raised from 1d to 2d on March ...