Jammu Plate Oilcolors

Apart from an anomalous black attested for a few days in January 1878, Jammu plate oilcolors come in a range of reds of sharply different hue and demeanor. They first appear (as do the oil circulars) in the summer of 1877 and remain in service to the spring of 1878, though infrequently after January of that year. The key reference is Eames India Post 29 88 1995.

Jammu Plate Oilcolor Reds

The item on the left is a detail from a cover dated 31 sâvan 1934 ~ 13 August 1877. The first rectangular oilcolors may have been in a vermilion-red shade (reported by Eames for June 1877) and this shade is also seen postally used in all three denominations of the circulars.

EUROPEAN LAID PAPER. A rare vertically laid white paper is known, and an example on cover can be seen on Staal Plate 6. Dawson & Smythies (p 14) report that the 1a counterpart has never been seen although it must have been printed. Shade types in distinctive brown-red oilcolor were at one time listed separately in the Scott catalogue, but again a copy of the 1a has never been seen (Boggs 1941.)

WHITE WOVE. This scan of a ½a dull red Jammu oilcolor on a thick wove paper is taken from a Jammu to Amritsar cover in the Hellrigl collection dated 22 assuj 1934 ~ 6 October 1877. There is another on a Jammu to Lun Miani cover dated 11 October 1877 at Behra. Pictures of the thick white woves in both denominations are shown on Staal Plate 6. The 1a is listed but unpriced in SG.

Jammu Plate Oilcolor Black

Black oilcolors are reported for only a few days in January 1878, a time of heavy use of the oilcolor black in the ½a circular. The ½a rectangular is known on perhaps a half dozen covers, none for the 1a. Séfi & Mortimer report four covers dated 17-20 January 1878 and there is a cover in the Hellrigl collection showing a delivery at Gurdarspur on 22 January.

The ½a grey-black on native paper. The plate was in a clogged state when these were produced over a short period of time. This example is from the Lunn collection, ex Dawson Lot 293, ex Eames.

The ½a black-blue on a 16 January 1878 Jammu to Lun Miani cover in the Hellrigl collection. This stamp is one of the great Jammu rarities, only four known. Another is pictured in Eames’ India Post 29 88 1995. The 1a may not be attested now.

Jammu Plate Oilcolor Yellow & Green

One notes the absence of yellow and any shade of green in the Jammu rectangulars. Mercies both.

Transitionals or Reprints?

Any reprinting that may have occured was severely restricted for reasons unknown.

Indeed, following Eames’ India Post 29 90 1995, could it be that what are designated as Jammu reprints in catalogues (specifically the items known as brown-red and steel-blue shown below) might be scarce color trials produced just before the retirement of the implement in May 1878? Suggestive of such early dating is that postally-used items from that month are found in what may be identical pigments (though they are not produced in nearly the same sharp fashion) as well as in what are kindred pigments, if somewhat thinned out, among the early New Rectangulars.

But it is the very sharpness and unmottled uniformity of the Jammu blocks that convinces other authorities that these items were produced late, possibly for collectors. Séfi & Mortimer take them to be early reprints, assigning them to 1881. After all, if such fine production were possible during the experimental year (which is hardly celebrated for its beauties) why do we find a regression to inferior printing technique? These sharp printings have parallels among the circulars. The brown-red circulars are seen on large pieces of native paper (9 cm tall) and one 4a is known gummed. Perhaps we have encountered some special presentation items. Whatever their status and date, these printings do form a notable subspecies of their own, and they are decidedly rare.

Above: Examples of intact sheets are unknown; in fact the 1a in the blue shade seems to be non-existent and they may have been purposefully destroyed. The practice of cutting out the 1a subject (very carefully) is also known with certain of the postal items from the watercolor period. Ex Ferrari, ex Haverbeck Lot 1319.

Above, the 4a brown-red & steel blue oilcolors on native paper as sharply-printed non-postal items. The blue is printed somewhat more heavily than the Jammu block; still its tones are identical in the respective light & dark portions when inspected in daylight. The color match on the brown-red is not so good, this having a touch of the wine to it. Closer matches are seen however, and it comes also in the 1a denomination in a sharper printing (pictured in the Eames’ oilcolor article cited above.)

Postal ‘analogues’ in starkly inferior printing, spring 1878. These shades executed on native paper are very close indeed to those of the Jammu blocks. The ½a brown-red circular is known only in postally used condition. Tim Eames records the 1a steel-blue on a cover from 20 May 1878, which is some 10 days after the first posting of a New Rectangular. This blue shade is also known unused in the ½a. If the sharply-printed Jammu blocks had already been produced at this time, why were the postal items, especially the blue, so much inferior in execution?

New Rectangular analogues? Though these are usually recorded as ink printings, these early issues on European laid paper have pigments that seem to be simply thinned-out versions of the oil pigments. In daylight the shades match quite well with the preceding in the thicker, darker splotches, but not so well in the thin regions.

Perhaps these four disparate pairings do not belong with each other conceptually. Interesting yes no?

Other Jammu Reprints

A couple of other very rare productions of the Jammu plate are reported in vermilion and bluish-green. The vermilion has a common counterpart in a 1a circular; the bluish-green in a ½a circular. Séfi & Mortimer (p 82) speak also of a very rare shiny yellowish-green reprint, a very shy item by all accounts. The bright blue that is referred to may be what is called ‘steel-blue’, but there is another blue sometimes mentioned in ‘deep blue’, that may or may not exist as such.

The Brighton Forgeries

For all that it doesn’t matter, we have never seen any examples of these Jammu-plate forgeries, and cannot even imagine what they are like. To form an exhaustive collection of Brightons today would be rather an accomplishment, so it would appear.

Staal-Sharma Reprint (ink 1981)

Of the Jammu Plate, 5 reprint impressions were done in purple ink and none in black ink.

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