Sealkote Markings 1866-76
The ancient name of Sialkot was Sāgala, which was occupied for a time by Indo-Greeks, late of Bactria. The ‘Sial-’ prefix is probably the echo of the ancient name, where the g goes missing in a standard way. The -kot means fortification. One theory preferred by some locals is that the fort was founded by a certain Raja Salban of the Sia caste.
The pronunciation “Shall Kote” is corroborated by the sometime explicit use in Persian of the triple dotting on the initial.
During our postal period, Sialkot was in British Punjab. Sialkot and Jammu are only some 27 miles apart; on clear days their higher vantage points are visible to the other. Sialkot was always the larger center. According to the 1891 census, Jammu had a population of some 36,000 residents, Sialkot about 55,000 (ref. Constable Hand Atlas 1893). As there was no British PO at Jammu until 1889 (when the railway extension shown on the map finally reached it), the cross-border mail had been handled by the British exchange offices at Sialkot and Sialkot City. Sialkot also hosted what was in effect an extra-territorial office for the State. There are overt postal markings attesting to the fact, namely a postage due seal and a duplex obliterator (both pictured on the Native Markings page 1878-79).
The Wikipedia Sialkot page (and several dozens of other pages that glean from Wikipedia word-for-word) reports that Sialkot was once itself the winter capital of J&K, but no dates do we find so far. Is it true? (Surely not?)
A rail branch line between Sialkot and Wazirabad was completed in 1880. One wonders whether the delivery time to Amritsar (with rail changes at Wazirabad and Lahore) was much faster than the runner’s time on the 70-mile direct line, which was typically a morning to evening affair. The rail extension from Sialkot to Jammu was not completed until a decade later, 1890, but that is still in time to affect the late mail history of our period.
The Sialkot office was #54. The station at Simla was #55, but examples of Simla and Kashmir postal connections are unaccountably (?) scarce given that British officialdom involved with Kashmir often took leave at Simla. The celebrated Edwardian railroad to Simla was constructed only after our period.
° British curved SEALKOTE+54 duplex and the Srinagar seal cancelling the 1a royal blue watercolor. The (separable?) duplex was in use between June 1865 in the pre-stamps period into perhaps early September 1867. The 54 must be distinguished from early and late species used with different datestamps: a scarce pre-stamps version known from 1864 can be seen in the Bard Papers on site, and there is a ringed-54 known from 1868. The detail shown above is from a 1 April cover in the Hellrigl Collection. The Victoria stamp is the ½a blue Die I, 1865, wmkd elephant head.
° SEALKOTE Open-Circle cds. This example is one of at least two cuttings. An earlier by some weeks (Jul-Aug 1866) was done in black in larger lettering. The red is reported sparsely over the rest of the year (Sep-Dec 1866). The corresponding open-circle type for UMRITSUR ceased service just shortly before the advent of the Native stamps. The image shown above is a detail from a cover in the Jaiswal collection that included the following special marking:
° Diamond of Dots (9×9) obliterator. Together with the
SEALKOTE datestamp shown downscreen a bit, this British obliterator was
applied by the Sialkot City Mail Agency, as opposed to the Sialkot Exchange Office itself. Reference Bard.
The image is a detail from a cover in the Jaiswal collection that included the preceding open-circle datestamp.
W. Hellrigl reports also a late strike of the diamond in blue for September 1869.
° Serifed SEALCOTE and SEALKOTE datestamps. The C-type datestamp was known already in the pre-stamp period and will outlive its K-type partner by as much as three years. The C-type is reported to be of the Sialkot Exchange Office while the K-type is of the Sialkot City Mail Agency. Both types are found sharing the same cover from October 1866 in shades of red, oranges, and finally black. Reports differ substantially about dates. There are also different cuttings. The basic type is found in duplex use with a circled-54 obliterator. The K-type is assumed gone sometime in the summer of 1871, though we have heard of a report for May 1872. The horizontal unserifed SEALKOTE + L-3 duplex supplanted the C-type in July 1874.
° U-26 obliterator. This implement, used by the Sialkot City Mail Agency, persisted in sporadic use for about two years starting perhaps in November 1866 to December 1868, when it also appears in violet. The marking is significantly wider than it is tall. This image is from a detail of an 1867 cover in the Hellrigl collection. This type is not to be confused with another U-26 obliterator of squarer shape surrounded by a circle seen in November 1870, where it is found in duplex with a rare serifed SEALCOTE CITY datestamp in arc.
° Serifed SEALCOTE + 54 duplex. This implement is known from spring 1868 and is attested to as late as perhaps February 1874. The image is a detail from an April 1868 cover in the Hellrigl collection. The cutting of the cds section is slightly different from that shown upscreen in the 1866 section.
° SEALCOTE triangle. This marking is known from July 1868 into the spring of 1870. This type, which was used on covers lacking British postage, had no overlap with its later counterpart in the CASHMERE triangle, which came into use at Srinagar (spring 1871) after Kashmir was admitted to the Punjab Circle. There are several other triangles of this type, Ferozepur for example. The red-orange shown above is a detail from a January 1869 cover in the Hellrigl collection.
° Serifed SEALCOTE CITY cds in arc + circled U/26 obliterator, rare. The cds (alone?) is reported also for June 1872 by Séfi. The much more prevalent unserifed type is known only from years later, late 1877.
° Horizontal SEALKOTE Type I + L-3 duplex. Perhaps July 1874. The implement was of the separable type, and the L-3 obliterator section stayed on for many years in other employment with other date stamps when this cds and other cuttings like it disappeared toward the end of 1876. Reports take the obliterator to as late as summer 1880. Not only do distinct cuttings exist for the cds portion, but Séfi & Mortimer report that the type also occurs with 1st or 2nd delivery notation, which must be decidedly scarce.
° Horizontal SEALKOTE Type II. This beautiful strike in a different cutting shows a usage independent of an obliterator. This is from a Jammu-Calcutta cover for August 1875.
° Horizontal SEALKOTE Type III, possibly from September 1874. This variant is easily distinguished by its larger lettering and by the shape of the S, which nudges the circle. Another features is the anomalously short L. This type did not supersede the earlier, and both are known in contemporaneous action to the end of 1876. This was the last of the SEALKOTEs, the spelling having been changed to SIALKOT in 1877.