The 4a+8a Composite Plate
For the early Jammu-printings period, there is no known example for either denomination in any in black or in any shade of blue. As for 4a reds, even they are rare in the early period, and still more so in attested postal use; the corresponding 8a is unattested in any condition. No full sheets in State I of the plate are recorded. The composite plate is thus a late-period affair, and this promises therefore to be a very short page.
The 4a red on laid paper, obliterated with the Jammu 12-bar. The scan is a detail (position #3 in the plate) from a Jammu-Srinagar registered cover in the Hellrigl collection, dated April 1881. That is to say, very late, for that is the date usually associated with the move to Srinagar.
Left: The 4a deep orange-red on a coarse yellowish thin wove paper, 1879-80. The example shown here is position #4 from the top-right corner of the plate. The absence of a screw mark shows that it was produced from the early state I of the plate, and thus Jammu-printed. On the right, a variety on thin grey-toned wove paper. A variety in a rather coarse yellowish thin wove is not uncommon, and another variety on bluish paper known in postal use, September 1885.