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International Letter-Post Tariffs
The Blue "Military Post" Stamps
 

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Three Signed Press Trials for the complete set (115kb)


In Febuary, 1953, to give favored treatment to the soliders, the Ministry of Posts and Telecommunication issued a set of "Military Post" stamps. The values in set were 3, the face values were all 800 old RMB, the design was "August 1st"------the emblem of the People's Liberation Army. Under the emblem, it printed "Military Post ", "Chinese People's Posts", "800 Yuan". The shading of the first design was orange-red, it was refered to as "Yellow Military Post" ; the second design was purple, it was refered to as "Purple Military Post"; the third one was blue, it was refered to as "Blue Military Post" . The size was 21mm * 32mm, the perforation was 14, the sheet composition was 90 (9 *10); the printing process was offset. The printer was Beijing People's Printing House. The issue had been scheduled as on August 1,1953. The stamps had been printed since early July,1953. They were the first military post stamps of China since 1949. Having been printed out, the stamps were distributed to the armies and military offices, each officer and ordinary solider were given two stamps per month for postage. Some armies commented that without code-named post boxes, the use of military post stamps could cause leak of secrets and the range and users of the stamps could not be controlled and so on. Therefore, the authorities decided to "postpone the implementation", and prohibited the using. Later, all the undistributed stamps were ordered to be destroyed. The stamps at the officers' and soliders' hands still could be used. These three kinds of stamps were in private collections, among which the blue "Military Post" stamps came out at a later date, so they were less and became very rare and valuable.

During an auction in 1994, a blue "Military Post" stamp was sold at 800,000 RMB. This was a record high in the history of stamps in China since 1949.

 
 
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