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Auction: 17025 - Bermuda, Crossroads of the Atlantic: A Postal History from 1617 to 1877 - The David Pitts Collection
Lot: 45

(x) Military Mail
The strategic importance of Bermuda had been apparent from the 18th. Century. In 1795, after the Revolutionary War, the British restored bases its bases on the American continent though it wasn't until the War of 1812 that there was a significant increase in the British naval presence on Bermuda. She became the winter home of the Atlantic fleet and the principal naval port between Halifax and the B.W.I. Halifax was the fleet's summer home
Concessionary Rates
The routing of military mail is not as easily explained as civilian mail. Mail was sent by the most expeditious method, usually by non-military ships. Military vessels carried civilian mail, their sendings were not advertised so their use was very much on an ad hoc basis
Officers rates
A special concessionary rate for officers of 6d. was in effect from 1 July 1857 until 31 December 1869. Prior to and after these dates regular rates applied
1868 (25 Sept.) envelope from St. George's to Glasgow, per Cunard Alpha to Halifax and thence by Allan Line City of New York to Liverpool, marked "Officers Letter" and bearing 1865 6d. dull mauve cancelled "B/1" and with superb "bermuda/st. g/paid" datestamp (P5) at top left with light Paid Liverpool Br. Packet datestamp (19.10) below, the reverse (flap tear) with arrival datestamp (19.10). Photo

provenance:
Sir Henry Tucker, October 1978
Morris H. Ludington, June 1999

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Sold for
£650