Following Part-1 of this article in the issue No. 169 of Kiku Shimbun, I have acquired a new and important item for my Showa period collection during my recent visit to Tokyo and the JAPEX’2016 exhibition, this being a Postal Charges Receipt form illustrating the usage of overprinted stamps issued for use in South Korea by the USA Military administration following the occupation of Korea.
Prior to the acquisition of this item two other such forms had been recorded, one being shown as Figure 4 in Part-1, from Yakmok. Kyeongsangpuk-do, which is located near the Seoul-Pusan rail line in the vicinity of Pusan, this item is illustrated below in order that additional information can be added. The item is from the Gold Medal collection of Hayashi-san, Japan.
What is the function of “postal charges receipt” ?
From the end of WWII to the issue of the first North Korean stamps in May 1946, the use of existing Japanese stamps was required for all mail, unfortunately the supply of these stamps was very limited and those that were available – mainly higher values – did not meet the postal rates. Therefore hand-stamps were produced for marking the mail as paid, and a ‘Receipt Form’ was completed on a daily basis with high value stamps being attached to the value of the hand-stamped posted mail of that day.
And further questions. Sorry I only have very limited knowledge in early Korean postal history. I’m more interested in the words from the front side than the stamps on the back.
Fig. 7a, upper part, regular postcard, 1 for 2sen(or chon), 2000 cards fee paid extra, so total is 4000 sen(chon) = 40 yen (won). Since each (old Japanese Samurai) card is 3 sen(or 5sen blue one?), it implies the basic postcard rate at 1946/02/11 is 5sen.
lower part, the first type, 3g, 1 for 10 sen. what is that rate? does it mean letter rate?
If my above hypothesis is correct, I am a little confused that, since it seems postal charges receipt only records the hand-stamped part; then, what does 10sen mean? Do those letters not have any stamps affixed but just a handstamp?
Thank you for your explanation. So this is an internal document of postal system, but I don’t really understand why they need to affix stamps on the receipt. Is it similar to revenue? And by the way, since this is an internal document, they can affix any available stamps, no matter it is old Japanese stamps or newly overprinted stamps. That causes mixed usage. However, how about the real mail? Any cover of mixed usage existed? I really like to see the pictures.
Let me have your e-mail address and I will send you a copy of the full article
Probably best not to leave email addresses in the comments section, spammers will pick it up. I will send a message to Yi-Fu Chen directly.
Thanks everybody, I’m new to early Korean postal history and really appreciate your help.