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| Year of the Poster |
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There are a series of poster stamps illustrating either patriot themes or certain towns within Great Britain, which are dated 1919 and 1920. These stamps are fairly scarce to find, and they are a mystery. This is rather surprising as there has actually been a book published about them (Les Vignettes Bonne Annee 1920 by Michel Bonneau and Louis Granger, I'Arc-en-Ciel, 1976 [Supplement 1977]). However,even now we are not much clearer in understanding why these stamps were produced. Were they commercial, patriotic, used for fund raising, or just done for packet sales?
At the end of 1919 a series of poster stamps were produced in France. There were 128 in total (as best as can be determined), all dated 1919-1920, featuring patriotic themes or towns and villages. When different colours are taken into account the total number of stamps that could be collected number more than 400. The majority are French scenes but there are also, in their own languages, those of Great Britain (31 different designs), Canada (three), Spain (one), US (one), Norway (one), Poland (two), Sweden (one), Switzerland (three), and Newfoundland (six). |
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| Mystery Origins |
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| The Bonneau and Granger book was published in the hope that members of the Arc-en-Ciel Society would be able to solve the mystery of who published, designed, and printed these stamps. There was only one response to the request for help. This came from a Captain Baudement who stated: 'Around 1920 or 1921 1 found myself at the home of one of my cousins, a wine maker of Nuits St. Georges. We were talking of postage stamps when his son, a student 12 years old, told me 'Here, these are for you' and gave me an envelope containing about 100 'Bonne Annee' seals'.The envelope contained a number of duplicates. Alas I destroyed the envelope, but I remember clearly that the inscription on the envelope read 'Syndicate for the Disaster Cities of the Valley of Munster'. From this memory type information, Granger assumed that all the stamps were published as some form of World War I Disaster Appeal. Walter Schmidt wrote an article entitled 'Porte-Timbres and Bonne Annes' in The Cinderella Philatelist" (Vol. 25, No 4, pp 85-90, October 1985), in which he attempts to attribute them to the Delandre publishing house. Personally we believe both are wrong in their hypothesis, and they are simply a series of poster stamps aimed to raise money for the publishers themselves, whoever they were. |
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| The British List |
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| For your interest we illustrate a number of these stamps and list all those known for'Great Britain'. Of particular interest is the fact that certain of the poster stamps bear a value - it's always 1/2d. The numbering is based on the Granger work, but has been extended. We number 32 stamps, but one stamp was published in 1917 by Delandre and definitely does not belong to the series. |
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| Patriotic Issues |
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The mother with twins
'England' poster stamp
(no.2) by F.Cormier
which came in blue,
green and red |
1 - Man, mother and child in blue and in red
2 - Mother with twins (illustrated), legend includes 'England'; artist named as F. Cormier. Comes in blue, green or red.
3 - For France England, mother and child, in blue, green and in red.
4 - Isle of Man (Arms and Manx cat), with value (1/2d), in red (should be under 'Town' type). 5 - St. George and the Dragon, legend 'Victory and Peace', in green and in red.
6 - Portrait of a bearded man within a picture frame, in three different colours = deep green, violet blue and in plum/mauve.
7 - Portrait of a lady with blouse and cravat, 1/2d value, violet.
8 -Mother and two children - text reads 'Remember the Brave, 1914-1920', pale violet and rose. 9 - 'British Empire' with a draped 'Victory' figure, 1/2d value, blue, green, red. |
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| Towns and Villages |
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Camelford helmet amongst
laurel leavas 1/2d violet. |
10 - Barnard Castle - the same as Camelford (no. 12 which is illustrated here) - 1/2d in violet.
11 - Bedford - picture of a whirlwind around a helmet decorated with laurel leaves on a large white cloud background, 1/2d violet.
12 - Camelford (illustrated here) - helmet amongst laurel leaves, 1/2d violet.
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Carlisle church (no.13)
in orange. |
13 - Carlisle (illustrated here) - church, olive green, light brown, orange.
14 - Carlisle again - the one illustrated in the book is a Delandre vignette (For French Wounded Soldiers).
15 - Chelmsford - picture of Victory with a sword and the Union jack, ruby coloured.
16 - Chester - church, similar in design to Gloucester (no. 23), dark green.
17 - Chipping Norton (illustrated here) - 1/2d, violet, mauve or orange, artist signed but can't determine the name.
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Chipping Norton (no.17) 1/2d
violet but artist can't be determined. |
Conway (no.18) with Wales
1920 message. |
18 - Conway (illustrated here) - dark green, rose, brown-mauve. |
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