Barbados 1852 Britannia 1d Blue

An island post office of its own

Unlike most British colonies, Barbados never used British stamps. The colonial authorities took over the island's internal post in 1851, under an Inland Post Office Act, while the British continued to run the mail packet agency at Bridgetown for overseas mail until 1858.

The new post office needed stamps, and it ordered them from Perkins, Bacon & Co. in London. The first shipment left on December 30, 1851, aboard the RMS Amazon, but the ship was lost at sea and the stamps never arrived. Replacement supplies reached the island in January and February 1852. The inland post office opened on April 15, 1852, and the stamps went on sale the same day.

Barbados is small, 21 miles long and 14 miles wide at its widest, and its post was organized by parish. The island had eleven parishes, and each parish post office got a number, from '1' for the general post office in Bridgetown to '11' for St. Lucy.

Britannia without a price

The design shows Britannia seated, based on a watercolor by Henry Corbould, and is believed to have been engraved by Frederick Heath. The stamps were printed by recess, from engraved plates.

The stamps did not show a value. That saved money: the Barbados order was combined with those for Mauritius and Trinidad. In Barbados the value was told by color. The first issue had a ½ penny in green, a 1 penny in blue and a 2 pence in grayish slate, with a 4 pence in brownish red added in 1855.

The scheme had a flaw. The 2 pence was supposed to be purple, as the island's inland postmaster described it in his report, but the ink came out a slate color close to the 1d blue. A collector's exhibit on the issue says very few 2d stamps were used for that reason. Between August 4 and September 21, 1854, during a shortage, the 2d was cut in half and used as a penny.

What a penny paid for

The 1d prepaid the inland letter rate for one ounce and also printed matter up to half a pound. The ½d, printed in a run of 180,000, paid the newspaper rate under the 1851 act, and the exhibit calls it the first halfpenny stamp issued in the British Commonwealth. The 1d was printed in a run of 450,000 and the 2d in only 10,000.

Letters to other islands show how the system worked. Surviving covers to merchants in Trinidad from 1855 carry a single 1d stamp for the inland postage. On arrival the recipient paid 4 pence more, the inter-island packet rate, because the British packet agency, not the island post office, handled overseas mail.

Stamps were canceled with oblong obliterators of bars enclosing the parish number, used from 1852 to 1863. Collectors try to find each first-issue value canceled in every parish, and some parish numbers are hard to find.

Blue paper and the hunt for the right shade

The first issue was printed on unwatermarked paper that turned blue because it reacted with prussiate of potash in the ink. That bluing is the main test that separates the first issue from later printings on white paper. Some stamps show heavy bluing.

The 1d comes in several shades, including blue, pale blue and a deep or dark blue. The standard British Commonwealth catalog lists the 1d dark blue on blued paper as number 4. The stamps were imperforate, cut apart with scissors, until perforated supplies began in 1860. Watermarked paper with a star did not come until 1870, and in 1874 the printing contract moved to De La Rue, which used the same plates.

Collectors call the identification of Barbados Britannias real detective work. Color fades over time, the 2d first issue looks like the 1d, and perforations and watermarks on later issues are hard to read. Forgeries of the first issue also exist.

Blocks, covers and what they bring

Unlike many classic stamps, the first-issue 1d survives in unused multiples. At a December 2018 auction, a left margin block of twelve of the 1852 1d blue, half of it never hinged, brought $720, and a block of eight of the 1855 1d deep blue brought $325. Another auction sold a block of eight of the 1d dark blue on blued paper, six stamps never hinged, for $140; the lot listing notes that the catalog values single stamps at £308 or more.

Covers are scarcer than stamps. The exhibit on the issue shows folded letter sheets sent from Barbados to merchants in Trinidad in 1855 and 1856, each with one 1d stamp, and blocks of four and six in the dark blue shade.

A collector's guide puts the 57 major Britannia stamps of 1852 to 1878 mostly in the tens to hundreds of dollars.

The numbers

Issue date

April 15, 1852

Quantity printed

450,000 (first-issue 1d)

Printing

Recess, Perkins, Bacon & Co., London

Perforation

Imperforate (perforated issues from 1860)

Paper

Unwatermarked, blued by prussiate of potash in the ink

Shades

Blue, pale blue, deep or dark blue

Rate

1 ounce inland letter; printed matter to half a pound

Companion values

½d green (180,000 printed), 2d grayish slate (10,000), 4d brownish red (1855)

Timeline

1. 1851

   The colonial authorities take over Barbados's inland post.

2. Dec 30, 1851

   The first shipment of stamps leaves on the RMS Amazon, which is lost at sea.

3. 1852

   Replacement stamps reach Barbados in January and February.

4. Apr 15, 1852

   The inland post office opens and the ½d, 1d and 2d Britannias go on sale.

5. Aug 4, 1854

   A shortage leads to the 2d being cut in half and used as a penny, until September 21.

6. 1855

   A 4d value is added.

7. Feb 20, 1855

   A 1d-franked letter sheet goes to a merchant in Trinidad.

8. 1858

   The British mail packet agency at Bridgetown closes.

9. 1860

   Perforated Britannias begin to replace imperforate stamps.

10. 1863

    The oblong parish obliterators are replaced by 'bootheel' cancels.

11. 1870

    Barbados stamps are first printed on star-watermarked paper.

12. 1874

    De La Rue takes over printing from the same plates.

13. Dec 2018

    A block of twelve of the 1852 1d blue sells for $720 at auction.

The world in 1852

• Feb 25, 1852

  HMS Birkenhead sinks near Cape Town, giving rise to 'women and children first.'

• Mar 18, 1852

  Henry Wells and William Fargo found Wells Fargo & Company.

• Mar 20, 1852

  Harriet Beecher Stowe's 'Uncle Tom's Cabin' is published in book form in Boston.

• Sep 14, 1852

  The Duke of Wellington dies.

• Sep 24, 1852

  Henri Giffard pilots the first airship trip, from Paris to Trappes.

• Nov 2, 1852

  Franklin Pierce is elected U.S. president.

• Dec 2, 1852

  Napoleon III is proclaimed Emperor of the French.

Price record

A realized auction price is what a buyer actually paid on the date shown, including the buyer's premium where the sale reported it. It is the strongest kind of reference price, and it is a record of one sale of one object on one day, not a promise of what the next example will bring.

By reference price, Barbados 1852 Britannia 1d Blue is number 96 of 100 in the stamps entries of the FLOAT 100. 82 of those 100 rest on a realized sale; the rest carry an asking price or a guide value, and each page says which. Rank within the FLOAT 100 itself (94 here) is editorial: how much an object defines its field, not price alone.

Did you know

• Barbados's first shipment of stamps went down with the ship that carried it.
• The stamps had no value printed on them; the 1d was simply the blue one.
• The 2d was meant to be purple but came out so close to the 1d blue that few were used.
• The blue tint of the paper came from a chemical in the ink, not from the paper maker.
• Barbados never used British stamps, unlike most British colonies.
• The companion ½d is described as the first halfpenny stamp issued in the British Commonwealth.