You are here -> Home -> History
& Geography -> Przedborz Philatelic History ->
Russian Partition Cancels 
Here's an 1892 cancel on a cover from Przedborz to Warsaw, proving that the former was in the Russian partition.
Scan courtesy of Martin Spufford.
- According to Mr. Spufford and his friends, "The letters following Przedbórz are P. O. or pochtovoe otdelenie, i.e. postal sub-office. The Kingdom of Poland as part of the Russian Empire had quite a few postal facilities (the Poles at the time were far more literate than the Russians) and most of them were postal stations [smaller than post offices or postal suboffices, ed.], but the large provincial towns and larger cities were either kontoras (or full post offices) or otdelenie (or suboffices). Przedbórz was a fairly good sized locality so it had a sub-office rather than a postal station."
- All writers seem to agree that at the time the Przedbórz stamps were issued, Przedbórz had a second-class post office. The above quote suggests that this was merely a continuation of its status during the Russian partition. This is entirely consistent with the hypothesis that Franczak, the postmaster, had merely continued the job he had under the Russians.
- Read more about Russian post offices.
4-Ring cancels
- The 1892 cancel shown above is not the only type of cancel used in pre-war Przedbórz; Prigara [1981, section 3, part 3] shows many types of cancels used in Russian Poland. I don't know which were used in Przedborz.
- In March 1858, however, numerical office designations were introduced. Przedbórz, in the Radom postal district, was office #157. (Prigara, Appendices 8 & 9. Appendix 8 provides a translation of the postal order introducing the numeric cancels.)
The Poland #1 stamp on the far right has a "sock-on-the-nose" (SON) 4-Ring cancel from office 157, Przedbórz. This a pretty rare item, although another was advertised on eBay in 2008, with a less-centered cancel. (The one shown is lot 2500 from a Cherrystone auction in November 2005, I believe. The scan has been touched up by Unca' Joetoshop.)
Here are some other scans of 4-Ring cancels, courtesy of Leon Finik and David Skipton. Office 1 was Warsaw, 169 was Pradla, in the Piotrkow "province" (voivodship?). (These are meant to be better scans of the cancels, not the stamps.)
- See a variety of cancels on Poland #1 at Stamp Encyclopedia Poland's cancels page, which shows lots of 4-ring cancels as well as concentric dot cancels, 4- & 6-square cancels, etc.
Bridge Cancels — used after 1903, according to David Skipton. This is a 17 Feb. 1914 Przedbórz cancel. (A "bridge" cancel typically has a circle with the date appearing within a pair of horizontal bars spanning across the center of the cancel, forming the "bridge". )
(This image has been "Joetoshopped".)
Other types of Przedbórz cancels probably existed in various periods. For example, David Skipton says we should look for:
"Cross-date" cancels. This is an example borrowed from http://lithuania.jkaptein.nl/tsaeng02_places.htm,
a website on Lithuanian postal history.
© 2008-2011 Sam Ginsburg;
Last modified 19 Oct. 2011.