Red (British) tax stamps… They appear to be random…

April 2, 2009 by  
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red_ink_stamp_2Recently a member inquired as to why the red-ink British tax stamps seemed to appear randomly within an issue – sometimes on the frontpage, sometimes on the backpage, and at other times somewhere within the issue. Although we had our thoughts on the subject, we called upon a collector of red-ink stamp issues, Randall Burt.  His thought substantiated our “hunch”:

“These newsprint publishers bought their stock from the
paper makers, and then were required by law to pay the paper tax on it at the gov’t
house where the paper was taxed at current rates.   The stamp was applied on
the blank sheets [pre-printing], then taken to their newspaper office where the news was added.

red_ink_stamp_1These tax stamps were not always in a desirable place for the collector. J.H. Chandler & H. Dagnall wrote extensively on this subject in their “Newspaper & Almanac Stamps of
Great Britain,” as did several other noted revenue writers.” Randall Burt

Thanks for your insight Randall.

If you have additional questions you would like to see addressed through the History’s Newsstand Blog, please comment to this post of send your questions to guy@rarenewspapers.com.

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