The Penny Black Stamp: A Brief Review
The Black Penny stamp or the Penny Black was the first clinging stamp to be used in the history which was introduced in the postal system of the United Kingdom and Ireland on May 1, 1840 as a part of the reforms made by Rowland Hill. All London post offices got official stamps to affix to the mails that went through them, but the practice of using Penny Black did not took hold immediately in the entire country. Post offices in other parts continued with their traditional method of paying for mail, which meant that the recipient was due for paying the postage.
The Penny Black was the brainchild of Sir Rowland Hill in an effort to revise the postal system. Hill's move of attaching a prepaid stamp to every mail was seen to have merits and so he was awarded a two year contract to run the new postal system in 1840. He organised a contest for new stamp design, but none of the received entries were considered worthy enough to be the winner. His initial design had been that of a rough impression of Queen Victoria as a young girl. Hill believed that it would be very difficult for imitators to replicate this design. The stamp had the word postage and the value of the stamp, but the
country name was not evident.
The Penny Black was in circulation for about one year. This was for the reason that the cancelled stamp of the postmaster was in red and was hardly seen against the black background. This meant that many people were using the stamps again and chiefly sending mail for free. The result of this was that the Treasury moved to the Penny Red and changed the co lour of the cancellation mark to black. The printing procedure of the Penny Black postage stamp required eleven plates.
There were 240 stamps printed on a single sheet and since perforation process had not yet been invented, the stamps had to be cut out using scissors. Although it is a collector item, the Penny Black stamp is not like rare stamps. There were nearly seventy million stamps printed in its short lifetime and many of these are still there today. The stamp dealers are selling stamps in normally inferior condition costing as low as $10 for a used one. A stamp in topmost condition, however, is much more expensive at about $3000.
In addition to the stamp that was used for regular mail, there was another version of the Black Penny printed for official use only. Such a stamp has the letters V and R in place of the stars on the top corners, which are there on the regular stamps.
The Penny Black was the brainchild of Sir Rowland Hill in an effort to revise the postal system. Hill's move of attaching a prepaid stamp to every mail was seen to have merits and so he was awarded a two year contract to run the new postal system in 1840. He organised a contest for new stamp design, but none of the received entries were considered worthy enough to be the winner. His initial design had been that of a rough impression of Queen Victoria as a young girl. Hill believed that it would be very difficult for imitators to replicate this design. The stamp had the word postage and the value of the stamp, but the
country name was not evident.
The Penny Black was in circulation for about one year. This was for the reason that the cancelled stamp of the postmaster was in red and was hardly seen against the black background. This meant that many people were using the stamps again and chiefly sending mail for free. The result of this was that the Treasury moved to the Penny Red and changed the co lour of the cancellation mark to black. The printing procedure of the Penny Black postage stamp required eleven plates.
There were 240 stamps printed on a single sheet and since perforation process had not yet been invented, the stamps had to be cut out using scissors. Although it is a collector item, the Penny Black stamp is not like rare stamps. There were nearly seventy million stamps printed in its short lifetime and many of these are still there today. The stamp dealers are selling stamps in normally inferior condition costing as low as $10 for a used one. A stamp in topmost condition, however, is much more expensive at about $3000.
In addition to the stamp that was used for regular mail, there was another version of the Black Penny printed for official use only. Such a stamp has the letters V and R in place of the stars on the top corners, which are there on the regular stamps.
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