The History of the Postmarks of the British Isles from 1840 to 1876 - John Hendy (1909)

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6o
THE POSTMARKS OF THE BRITISH ISLES FROM mO.
X Pa/o -7.
Cc 570(5^
F!g. 347. Fig. 348.
The first contract for the Peninsula service (Vigo, Oporto, Lisbon, Cadiz, and Gibraltar)
was made with Mr. R. Bourne in 1837, the vessels sailing from Falmouth, and
letters dispatched by them were impressed in London with the stamp shown in Fig. 349.
Via Falmouth
Fig. 349.
In 1843 the contract was transferred to the Peninsular and Oriental Steam Navigation
Company, who also had the contract for the India and China mails, and Southampton
then became the port of embarkation, instead of Falmouth. A contract was made
in 1840 with the Royal Mail Steam Packet Company, for the conveyance of mails by
steam between England, the West Indies, and the Gulf of Mexico. Their vessels sailed
from Southampton, but continued for many years to call at Falmouth to embark the
mails, and although, in 1852, Falmouth ceased to be a packet station, it still remained
the packet office for a portion of the West Indian and South American mails. The
packet offices, as arranged for the different mails, were as follows :—London and Southampton
were packet offices for the Continental mails, the East and West Indies and South
America ; Liverpool and Londonderry took the United States and Canada ; while the
mail packets for the Cape of Good Hope and the West Coast of Africa sailed from
Devonport, both Plymouth and Devonport acting as packet offices. The following are
the various types of stamps in use at the offices (Figs. 350-371)
:
.•I A
•'LIVERPOOt
BR. PACKET
'.
'••
'. JU3Q
;
iverpool\
BR'
PACKD-J
SP 59j
Fig. 360. Fig. 351.
Fig. 352.
Fig. 363.
LIVERPOOL
? 1.859 <L'
A 58>fC*
Fig. 354.
Fig. 356.
Fig. 356. Fig. 357.