Welsh Postal Oddities

   Apart from the Railway Letter stamps of some the narrow gauge railways of Wales, the principality, on the surface, seems to be rather deficient in those collectables known as Cinderella stamps. In 2009 I decided to rectify this perception by seeking out examples of this genre and distributing them to collectors. Included with each mailing would be story and history behind the stamps in order that they wouldn’t just be ‘little bits of paper’, but would illustrate life in Wales as it was, or indeed how it still is.

Over the following months there were items from obscure railway letter services, local posts, souvenir labels, poster stamps, rare official stamps, private issues and some unusual covers. The range was extended to overseas Welsh territories such as the Welsh colony in Patagonia and those in Antarctica and the Indian Ocean. It was necessary to go beyond standard reference works to source these stamps and the background information. The Aberystwyth novels by
Malcolm Pryce* were an excellent and unexpected source of background information on some sets of stamps. The Caru Foundation**, archivists of the little known Welsh author Huw Puw Caru, were invaluable for those issues which were inspired by his short stories.

Mostly only single stamps were available in sufficient numbers, but other times complete sheets of stamps were available. The range was also extended to include the Welsh regional special issues, are these are not well known having been shunned by the well known cataloguers.

An unusual feature of Welsh Cinderella stamps (shared with some other issues) is the occasional stamp which differs from the others by a small design detail. Because they can be hard to spot these have earned themselves the term ‘diabolos’,

 

More information and discussion about these stamps, and all other Cinderella stamps can be enjoyed on the
Cinderella Stamps Forum and a full listing of these stamps with variations etc can be found on these pages

    

    

   Please note: These pages are designed to work best using Mozilla Firefox