DESCRIPTION

5¢ Brown Orange (1d), block of four, gorgeous vivid color on deeply blued paper, large margins on three sides and ample to barely in at bottom, tied by light strikes of orange-red grid cancel, matching "Fredonia N.Y. Apr. 27" (ca. 1850) circular datestamp on large part of printed folded bank reporting form to the Comptroller Office, Free Bank Department, Albany, New York, block pays 20¢ postage for double rate (half ounce to one ounce) for distance over 300 miles--Fredonia is about 330 miles west of Albany--the printed form with manuscript entries (in italics) reads "QUARTERLY...the true condition of the H. J. Miner Bank of Utica...Saturday, the Twenty Ninth day" (H. J. Miner established a bank in Fredonia in 1850)#

PROVENANCE

Edward S. Knapp, Parke-Bernet Galleries, May 5-10, 1941, lot 2193, where described as "beautiful impression and in grand condition, considered the finest known block on cover"

C. C. Seabrook (ownership noted in 5/17/1948 letter to Ashbrook, index card files at The Philatelic Foundation)

Ryohei Ishikawa, Christie's Robson Lowe sale, 9/28-29/1993, lot 51, to Craveri

Guido Craveri, Bennett sale, 9/20/2003, lot 1132, to Hackmey

Joseph Hackmey (collection sold privately to William H. Gross, 2010)

CENSUS, LITERATURE AND EXHIBITION REFERENCES

USPCS census no. 5706 https://www.uspcs.org/resource-center/censuses/1847-cover-census/

Lester G. Brookman, The 1847 Issue of United States Stamps, 1942, p. 23, fig. 22

-- United States Postage Stamps of the 19th Century, Vol. I, p. 29, fig. 26

Duane B. Garrett, "Domestic Postal Rates for the 1847 Issue Period, Part I," Chronicle 108, p. 232

Jonathan W. Rose, Classic United States Imperforate Stamps, p. 10

CERTIFICATION

The Philatelic Foundation (1993) as Brown Orange, which at that time was a sub-listed shade of Scott 1b Orange Brown--it is now separately listed as Scott 1d

CONDITION NOTES

Extremely Fine; top left stamp has a tiny scrape of no significance

HISTORY AND COMMENTARY

The Finest of Only Three Known 5¢ 1847 Blocks on Cover

Only three blocks of the 5¢ 1847 are recorded on covers, including the block of five on cover to England offered in this sale (lot 152) and a block of four on a front address panel (without flaps) to Montreal, Canada. This cover with a block in the Brown Orange shade is the only domestic use and the finest of the three recorded.

The 5¢ was printed over four years in a range of shades, including the scarcer Orange Brown and Brown Orange. The printing impression indicates that this block was probably a later printing, circa 1850, made from the cleaned and reworked plate, a process used by Rawdon, Wright, Hatch & Edson to improve the quality of prints made from the well-worn plate after years of use. The shade has a strong orange hue, and the paper is very bluish. These are the distinct traits of the late Brown Orange shade.

The Act of March 3, 1845, created two letter rates: 5¢ per half ounce for distances up to 300 miles (and 5¢ for each additional half ounce); and 10¢ per half ounce for any distance over 300 miles within the United States. By comparison, the old rates were based on five distance parameters and multiplied by the number of pages in a letter. The under-300 and over-300 miles distance provision was considered essential, because of the country's size and the costs of transporting mail. The 5¢ under-300 miles rate would pay to send a half-ounce letter from New York City to the major East Coast cities of Boston, Philadelphia or Baltimore (but not between Boston and Philadelphia or Baltimore). The distance between post offices was calculated by postal route, not "as the crow flies." For this reason, a letter might require the higher over-300 miles rate, even though the origin and destination were less than 300 miles apart.

The original Senate bill (S. 46, December 19, 1844) and subsequent versions debated in the House and Senate contained different rate calculations, including multi-tiered distance parameters and rate progressions per sheet of paper or quarter-ounce weight increments. The bill was amended on January 16, 1845, to set the distance limit to 100 miles. Finally, on March 1, 1845, the Senate voted 37 to 7 in favor of changing the distance limit to 300 miles. (The various bills and Senate reports can be found online at memory.loc.gov).

Surprisingly, the 1845 law failed to give the postmaster general authority to issue stamps. The Act of March 3, 1847, remedied that glaring omission, and the 5¢ and 10¢ stamps were issued on July 1, 1847. This cover traveled more than 300 miles between Fredonia and Albany, New York, and it weighed between a half and one ounce--thus, 20¢ postage was paid for double the 10¢ over-300 miles rate.

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