United States to Italy via Garibaldi?

The Project:
One of the first clues a postal historian has that something different than usual might have occurred is a date span that is longer than usual between the entry of the item in the mails and its reported delivery.  This item took 23 days to arrive at the destination post office.  Or, at least, it took that long before it was processed by that location.  This is as much as one week longer than usual, but easily 3-4 days late.

Last Updated: 11/4/19

General Description
This item was mailed in Boston Mass. and exhibits a Boston exchange office transit mark dated September 17.  The receiver marking on the reverse indicates that it was received at the Rome office on Oct 10, 1867.  The envelope has an 1861 design 24 cents stamp and a 3 cent stamp affixed to the envelope apparently paying the 27 cent rate per 1/4 ounce via the French Mails to Rome.  The  Boston mark is a dark reddish-brown color that could be mistaken as black.  The Boston marking clearly says that the postage is "paid" but the color to indicate an item as paid is red, whereas black is supposed to indicate an item is not paid.  The item must have been treated as unpaid as there are two due amounts on the front.  The "27" was apparently recognized as an error and smudged, then crossed out.  The 23 remains for collection at delivery to Mr. Langdon Williams in Rome.

Route
Boston Sep 17
New York (Sep 18)
     Cunard Line Persia
Queenstown (Sep 27)
     London, Calais, Paris, Marseilles, Civitavecchia *
Roma Oct 10 67 (verso)

* assumed route given no additional markings
The slower route for this item in 1867 would potentially have been via Marseilles and via ship to Civitavecchia.  By late 1867, most mail to Italy would have gone via rail with entry at Modane.  However, with tension between Rome and the Kingdom of Italy and the favorable connections between the Papacy and France, using the sea route may have been preferred here.

Rate Breakdown
from Boston/US perspective - 27 cents for letter <= 1/4 ounce
   24 cents credit to France which includes
        6 cents to Britain for the British Packet carriage on the Cunard Line
from Rome's perspective - 23 bajachocci due - single rate from Rome to the U.S. for <= 1/4 ounce via France
    potentially they felt it was a double weight letter and required another rate.  However, the French convention stated that underpaid mail should be treated as unpaid mail.  This may not have always been the case in all locations as there are documented instances in the German States where the deficit rate only was charged.  Perhaps this applies here as well?


Effective Postal Treaties
At this time, there was no treaty for mail to be directly exchanged between the United States and the Kingdom of Italy or the Papal States.  Instead, mail to Italy was serviced under postal agreements through other countries.  The French Mails were by far the most common service utilized to get U.S. mails to Italy at a rate of 27 cents per 1/4 ounce (7.5 grams). While there are no markings that can be specifically attributed to the French Mails on this cover, it is unlikely other options, such as the Prussian Closed Mail or Hamburg/Bremen mails were used here.

Prior to the Franco-Papal Convention of 1853
 Letters from the Roman States to the United States could be paid only to the point mail was transferred between the British and American postal systems.  In other words, if the Atlantic sailing had an American contract, the point the item boarded the ship is when the American postal system began charging for the due amount.  Thus, 21 cents would be due on delivery in that case.  On the other hand, if it was a British Packet to cross the Atlantic, the recipient would owe 5 cents for the US Surface mail.  In any case, the cost to get a letter from the Roman States to that point would be 27 bajocchi for each 6 denari (7.1 grams or about 1/4 ounce).

Letters from the US to the Papal states would have to have the US portion prepaid (5 or 21 cents).  The rest was paid for at delivery using the Roman distances.  1st distance was 42 baj, 2nd distance an additional 41 baj and 3rd distance another 40 baj. (at least this seems to be how it was done by my reading)

The Franco-Papal Convention of 1853
38 baj per 7.5 grams to entry into US postal system from the Papal system.  Also 38 baj per 7.5 grams on delivery in Roman States for items prepaid to departure from US System as above.  The US postage amounts followed the British scale (1/2 ounce, 1 ounce, 2 ounce, and each ounce from there).  5 cents for British Packet and 21 cents for American Packet.

An alternative could be mail sent to Rome form the US via the British Open Mail.  In that case, the rate for unpaid mail from Britain would be charged on delivery.

The Franco-American Convention of 1857
Effective April 1, 1857 until Dec 31, 1869, it established the 27 cent per 1/4 ounce rate for prepaid letters to the Papal States via France.

The Franco-Papal Convention Addendum of 1858 
Rate is now 32 baj per 7.5 grams.  These are now paid to destination now that the US/France Convention was in place.  Partial paid letters were treated as unpaid.  Rate is same to prepay a letter to US as it is to pay for unpaid letter from the US.

Amendment 1866 (Sep 1, 1866-Dec 31, 1869)
The rate was reduced to 1.15 lire for each 7.5 grams of weight.  23 baj = 1.15 lire. this is the amount for both prepaid letter to the US and unpaid letter from the US. 

Historical Connections
During this period in time, Italy was in the process of unification.  The Papal territory of Rome and the surrounding area, with the support of France, were resisting joining the Kingdom of Italy.  It is possible delays in this mailing had something to do with Garibaldi's forces engaging Papal forces near Rome.

Langdon Williams 
Langdon Williams was born June 24, 1830 and died in Rome, Italy on May 9, 1872 at a relatively young age and just 24 days after the birth of his third son.  That child died later that month.  His wife, Anna, and two children (ages 8 and 10) were still living in 1883 according to "The Provisional Councillors of Pennsylvania Who Held Office between 1733 and 1776...and their Descendants" by Charles P Keith.

Questions

1. Clearly the item was considered to have postage due by the recipient.  Was there a correct and valid postal reason for this due amount, or was it clerk error that cost the recipient money for the privilege of receiving the item?
2. Did this item travel via the French mails, as is mostly likely the case?  Or is there an alternative route that might explain either the due amounts or the extended delivery period.
3. This item took much more time to arrive than most items to Rome in the 1860's.  It is not unreasonable to state that this item arrived a week later than normally expected for a mailing on the 17th of September.  What might the reasons be for the delay?  Could it be that it was delayed due to the military activity around Rome?
4. Has the ink of the Boston exchange mark oxidized from an original red color, or is this coloration representative of what the Rome office might have seen in 1867?  If so, could the dark coloration make them believe it was short paid and should thus have postage due?
5. Is it possible this item merely shows one (or more) clerk blunders and there is no other logical explanation for why it was given the markings and treatment it seemed to receive?

Supporting Materials

Item treated as paid from the United States to Rome via French Mail 1862

1862 cover, Boston to Rome via French Mail at 27 cent per 1/4 ounce rate

While this item is five years prior to the cover in question, it still falls under the same postal arrangements to Rome.  The Boston exchange marking is clearly red, which indicates the item was paid to the receiving exchange office(s).  The black circular marking is a French Mail marking and the P.D. in a box also indicates that the item is paid (probably a French marking as well?).  The diagonal black line was the normal method the Roman postal clerks indicated that no postage was due.

 Item treated as paid from United States to Rome via French Mail in 1865

This item shows a Philadelphia exchange office marking, again in red.  The "18/1" in red also indicates that the item was paid with the item indicating how much of the 27 cents postage went to France from the U.S.  The "1" in the "18/1" indicates that the item was weighed a single rate letter (1/4 ounce or less).  Again, this item shows French mail markings, a PD in box AND the diagonal Roman marking indicating the item as having no postage due.

Item treated as paid from United States to Rome via French Mail in late 1867

The pattern remains the same even after the cover in question.  This essentially begs the question - what was different about the first item that caused it to be treated differently OR what was different in the world at the time that item was going through the postal systems.

Garibaldi and the Attack on Rome
The news of the process of the unification of Italy and, in particular, the exploits of Garibaldi caught the imaginations of people world-wide.  Below are snippings from the Mercury, the Hobart, Tasmania newspaper of that time.

Garibaldi was on record as being vehemently against the Papal State and the Catholic Church calling it the "shame and plague of Italy"  at a congress of European leaders in Geneva earlier in September.  He created a rather overt plan to march on Rome with 10,000 volunteers to coincide with an insurrection within the city.

These attempts to cause an insurrection and take over Rome failed in large part because the Kingdom of Italy did not support the effort.  The French also sent a garrison to support the Papal forces in Rome (largely European volunteers).  The French forces were finally removed in 1870 with the event of the Franco-Prussian War.

Of interest here is that the timing of these events would coincide with the normal delivery period of the piece of mail in question.

A possible clue in a Britain to Italy item 1874

The reference to closed mail from Britain comments to Dick Winter by the Italian postal historian likely reference the services outlined by this item.  While these items traveled via France under agreement, they traveled in "closed" mail bags through France, not being opened until arriving in Italy - in this case on the railroad "ambulante" post office on the Modane-Torino section of Italian rail.  There are no French markings on this item or others like it.

 However, as Mr. Winter suggests, an item to Italy via the French Mails should not have been opened and rebagged by the British to go via this service.

Project Status
In Progress

• there are still details that I have uncovered over time that need to be added to this post
• could add more details to supplementary covers (like days to delivery) but do not want to distract from the original purpose of the post
• reference or relevant portions of the US French agreement currently effective could help.

This item has been discussed on Richard Frajola's PhilaMercury Discussion Board and I have had some discussion with other postal historians, including Dick Winter.

It is likely that there will be no definitive answer for some of the questions this postal history item raises without significant conjecture.  It would be interesting to see if there are other items arriving in Rome during this time that were similarly delayed - if not necessarily found to be postage due.

The Wreck of the North American

The Project
Navigating the Saint Lawrence Seaway could be tricky and it was not uncommon for ships to encounter difficulties in the 1800’s. In particular, the waters around Anticosti Island were most treacherous, with 106 recorded shipwrecks between 1870 and 1880 despite the existence of lighthouses by that time [1]. The sea lane was used for ocean traffic of all sorts, including mail packets, so it is possible to find postal history artifacts relating to accidents involving Anticosti Island. This article focuses on the travels of piece of mail that was placed aboard the North American, an Allan Line ship, in 1867.

Last Update: 1/ 13/18

The Perils of Anticosti 
Anticosti Island can be found at the mouth of the St Lawrence Seaway as it enters the Gulf of Lawrence. Louis Jolliet, an explorer who initially believed the Seaway would provide water crossing to the Pacific Ocean, was awarded ownership of the island for his service to New France. Starting in 1680, he ran a fur trading and fishing business from the north shore of the island until it was raided by New Englanders in 1690. After that, his son divided and ran the island for the next 40 years [2]. By the 1860’s, an estimated 2000 ships passed the island each summer [1]. The island is now owned by the Quebec government, serving as a popular game and fishing reserve.
Anticosti Island is not a small obstruction in the St Lawrence Seaway, having 360 miles of shoreline and covering 3100 square miles. It is surrounded by a reef that can reach out a mile and a half from the visible shoreline. The reef, combined with a strong southeasterly changing to south current led to numerous shipwrecks resulting in varying degrees of loss to life and property [2].

Strong currents and reefs could certainly be mapped and lighthouses were built to help for nighttime navigation. However, experienced Seaway navigators recognized variations in compass readings could lead the unwary to run aground. An editorial to the Quebec Mercury in 1827 included observations from a mariner of that time:

“… it would be well that all ships at every opportunity should try experiments on the variation of the compass. I am fully of opinion that it does, and has increased. Since my first coming up the St. Lawrence, and very lately from experiments made, I found six degrees more variation than ever I expected, of my courses steered.” [3]
 

Wrecks on Anticosti Island from 1820-1911 by Department of Marine and Fisheries, Quebec Agency

These variations are known to be due to the shifting magnetic pole and its dramatic effect on compass readings as one goes further north on the globe. The treacherous nature of the waters around Anticosti caused many ships to employ a local navigator for the run into and out of the Seaway.

The Allan Line 
 The Province of Canada was very interested in supporting a steamship company that based itself out of Canada rather than continuing to be tied to the United Kingdom’s Cunard Line for trans-Atlantic mail sailings. In 1855, the Montreal Ocean Steamship Company (Allan Line) secured a contract to carry Canadian mails, which it proceeded to carry out upon the return of their ships from the Crimean War [4]. Allan Line ships departed Quebec (Riviere du Loup) in the summer when the St Lawrence Seaway was free of ice. During the winter months, the Allan Line left from Portland, Maine.

The Canadian and United States governments reached an agreement in November of 1859 that granted the Allan Line a contract to carry American mails [7]. Mail from the United States was sorted and placed in secured mailbags in United States exchange offices. Most mails carried by the Allan Line originated in the Detroit or Chicago offices. However, some mailbags from Boston and New York were sent on to Portland to be placed on board Allan Line mail packets when it was determined that this would be earliest mail packet departure. Normally, each piece of mail was hand stamped with a red (paid) or black (unpaid) marking that included the city name of the exchange office and a date. Chicago, on the other hand, often employed a credit marking that gave the amount credited to the foreign mail service with the word ‘cents’ in an arc underneath. Other offices typically used the date the ship was scheduled to leave port in a standard circular date stamp marking. Mailbags left the Detroit and Chicago offices via the Grand Trunk Railroad to their Quebec (summer) or Portland (winter) destinations [5].

The North American 
The North American was a single screw, 1715 gross ton ship that was originally named the Briton at the point William Denny & Brothers laid the keel in 1855. The ship was launched as the North American on January 26, 1856 and took her maiden voyage from Liverpool to Quebec on April 23 of that same year. The ship was able to accommodate 425 passengers and served as one of the fleet of mail packets for the Allan Line. In 1871, the ship was moved to a Liverpool – Norfolk – Baltimore route until it was sold in 1873. At this point, the ship was converted to a sailing vessel and was used as such until it went missing in 1885 during a trip from Melbourne to London [6].

On June 16 of 1867, the North American ran aground on the south shore reef of Anticosti Island outbound to the Atlantic Ocean from Quebec. All passengers and crew survived the incident, spending some time on the island. Accounts indicate that they enjoyed picnics of fresh trout and were treated well by a Mr. and Mrs. Burns, who lived on the island at that time. The home occupied by Mr. and Mrs. Burns was furnished with material from other wrecks and they had survived a shipwreck themselves fourteen years earlier [1]. The St George picked up the passengers and the mail, taking them to St. Johns, Newfoundland. As for the North American, it was successfully refloated and towed to Quebec for repairs. It resumed its services to the Allan Line on November 12, 1868.

A Postal Artifact of the Grounding of the North American
Mails sent from the United States to Britain were governed by the 1848 agreement which remained in force until the end of 1867. Under this treaty, letters from the United States to Scotland required postage at the rate of 24 cents (1 shilling) per half ounce of letter weight. The cover illustrated nearby was prepaid with a 24 cent denomination adhesive from the 1861 series. The postage was then split between the British and US postal services in the following manner: 5 cents for US surface mail, 16 cents for the country who contracted the mail packet and 3 cents for British surface mail [5]. The red “3 cents” credit on the top left of this cover was applied in Chicago and indicated that 3 cents were owed to the British postal system by the US postal system. The Allan Line ship was under contract to carry mails with the United States, thus 16 cents were kept to defray the expense of that contract.
The Galesburg June 10 postmark in blue and the July 10 Glasgow receiving postmark indicate an abnormally long journey to get to its destination. Galesburg was not terribly far from an exchange office (Chicago) and the Grand Trunk Railroad should have delivered the mailbag containing this letter to Quebec in no less than two days time from Chicago. The crossing of the Atlantic typically took no more than 10 to 14 days, thus this letter was delayed for nearly half a month while it was in the mailbag.

The agreement with Canada dictated that United States mails were ‘closed’ in mailbags as they traveled over Canadian soil. No intermediate date stamps appear on the cover, which is consistent with its residing in a mailbag the entire time it was in transit from a U.S. exchange office (Chicago) to a British exchange office (Glasgow, Scotland). The receiving exchange office would open the mailbags and route each letter according to its destination. Some would be marked to go on to a more distant location (China, India, Australia, etc.) and placed in new mailbags to be put on ships for the appropriate destination. Others, such as this one, were placed in the local mail stream in order to be delivered to the intended recipient.

This cover provides sufficient evidence to show that the letter must have sailed on an Allan Line ship and that it was delayed. Shipping tables confirm that the North American was scheduled to leave Quebec in the middle of June in 1867 [7]. As a result, a timeline that illustrates the travels of this piece of mail can be reconstructed. After being placed in a mailbag in Chicago, the letter traveled by train to Quebec where it was placed on the North American prior to its departure on June 15. The next day, the North American ran aground at Anticosti. Soon after, the St George picked up the mailbags and took them to St John’s, Newfoundland. Another Allan Line mail packet, the Austrian, picked up the mailbags on its way to Quebec. The mailbags remained on the ship as it was prepared for its westward journey, which began on June 29. The Austrian arrived at Liverpool on July 9^th, where it was then routed to Glasgow, completing a very interesting voyage.

Bibliography/Citations
[1] ] Mackay, D. Anticosti: The Untamed Island, McGraw-Hill, 1979.
[2] Henderson, B. Anticosti Island, KANAWA Magazine, Winter 2003 Issue, http://paddlingcanada.com/kanawa/issues/winter03.php, last viewed 1/15/06.
[3] Quebec Mercury #41, Tuesday, May 22, 1827, Page 241.
[4] Arnell, J.C. Steam and the North Atlantic Mails, Unitrade Press, 1986, p 224-5.
[5] Hargest, G.E. History of Letter Post Communication Between the United States and Europe 1845:1875, 2^nd Ed, Quarterman Publications, 1975, p 133-136.
[6] Bonsor, N.R.P. North Atlantic Seaway, vol. 1, Prescott: T. Stephenson & Sons, 1955, p. 307.
[7] Hubbard, W.  & Winter, R.F. North Atlantic mail Sailings 1840-1875, U.S. Philatelic Classics Society, 1988, 129-30,148.

Introducing the GFF Postal History Blog

Welcome to the GFF Postal History blog.  This is our first "official" post to be published, even though there has been material at various stages of writing for some time that are not yet published.

For those who are interested, I invite you to go the tab labeled "Purpose" to get an idea as to the intentions I have in creating this blog.  But, for now, we'll introduce by example!  Posts on this blog are NOT necessarily intended to be final products when they appear here.  I fully expect to continue to add to posts when any of the following things occur:

1. I find time to put in additional information and resources I have discovered in the past, but have not had time to put into a format for the blog.
2. I discover new information or resources for the post/project in question.
3. I receive feedback that helps me to understand an item or process well enough to explain what is happening better than I had before.
4. I feel I have reached a critical mass and I want to organize the results into a 'final' post format

It is possible that I will either edit prior posts or simply publish a new post as a new version of a prior post.  We'll see how it works out.