Letters, posts, and expresses.

[mary]

In re-reading several posts on the discussion board, one from Mr. Krainik regarding the Kimball letter of 1834 caught my eye:

The E. B. Kimball letter sent from Galena, Illinois in 1834 is philatelically known as a "stampless cover." The term refers to "mail sent before the introduction of postage stamps in 1847. Up to that time, letters could be sent either Prepaid or Due - the latter was most common - and the amount of postage was marked in pen or with a handstamp on the letter. Mail carriers had to collect the postage from the recipient if it had not been prepaid." No envelope was involved. The letter was folded and secured with sealing wax.

Might I inquire from the board participants as to the size and kind of writing paper available in the 1820s-1830s?

Was sealing wax always red or dark red in color?

Is there a source or idea regarding postal rates to/from the Mineral District (I believe that such rates were determined by distance the letter had to travel)?

Are there examples of cancellation stamps from this time period? Or was this something that came about with the use of postage stamps?

Many thanks!

Mary

[pshrake]

Hi Mary

We have several samples of letters from the late 1830s and early 1840s here at the Sauk County Historical Museum, and (I am writing from home) off the top of my head the general size of paper has been near to or just a little smaller than regular 8x 11 1/2 paper. I will dig up our samples and make a more accurate measurement and post it in the future. As to the wax, all were red seal wax. To me the intersting thing was that many were the little pre cut wafer discs. All of our samples were perfecly circular, and completely in between the sheets of papar, that is to say that when folded over you would not have seen the wax at all.

Another good place to look at seal waxed documents, is the official records on national archives microfilm. Though black and white, they do show where the wax seal was, and how the paper was normally folded. I will look through my document collection and see if I can find any other noticeable traits.

Pete

[Robert Braun]

This thread has inspired an article on "Early Mail," which will be featured in our upcoming OLRHS newsletter.

Great topic, and one easily overlooked!

Bob.

[Greg Carter]

And it was a good article too!

Although a bit later in time and date, The Lincoln Law Office State Historic Site in Springfield has a post office in it and there are several very interesting pieces of antebellum mail in their collection, including a copy of a letter that was written in four different intersecting directions to save the "pay per page side" price of writing on both sides of one page of paper.

Also, there is a book out on the Lewis and Clark Expedition, called "museum in a book" that has a pile of journal pages, letters, envelopes, cyphers from 1804-1806 reproduced in exacting detail that are nice pieces to look at. My mom bought the book new for my birthday for me so that was in May, 2004.

GMC