Overview by Gordon Stimmell
The first stamps used for carrier service were issued in 1842 after the government Post Office bought out the privately owned City Despatch Post in New York City. The government also hired its former owner Alexander Greig as a carrier and his local stamp (Scott 40L1), cancelled by a “U.S.” or by the newly renamed “U.S. City Despatch Post” handstamp became the first carrier stamp (Scott 6LB1) in August 1842. Within a month the Post Office issued its first own carrier stamp (Scott 6LB3) in blue, with “United States” added to the design. The span of these stamps was 1842 to 1846.
The next series of Carrier stamps are the Semi-Official Issues, spawned in 1849 during a little publicized Post Office reorganization that saw a one cent fee for carrier service imposed in major U.S. cities, presumably in response to the persistent competition of private local posts. The first stamps, called “tickets” showed up in Boston (Scott 3LB1), Charleston (Honour’s City Express, Scott 4LB1), New York (Scott 6LB9), Philadelphia. (Scott 7LB1) and St. Louis (Scott 8LB1-2). Baltimore issued its semi-official stamps the next year, in 1850 (Scott 1LB1). These operations were run by carriers employed by and with the blessing of those cities’ Post Offices.
In 1851, the government attempted to standardize carrier stamps by issuing two “Official” carrier stamps, the Franklin carrier (Scott LO1) and the eagle carrier (Scott LO2), to be valid in all major U.S. cities, unlike the semi-official carriers, which were only for use in the city in which they were issued. It is an enduring mystery why the Franklin carrier, with 330,000 stamps sent to New York, New Orleans, and Philadelphia, is such a great rarity today. I presume its close resemblance in colour and portrait design to the regular one cent Franklin issue of July 1, 1851, bred confusion among postal patrons as to usage. Was the stamp withdrawn? Whatever, the September LO1 was joined – or perhaps replaced – by LO2 in November, which saw widespread use for several years in American cities, and survives in far greater numbers.
Other U.S. cities also issued semi-official carrier stamps through the mid1850s, including Cincinnati (Scott 9LB1), Cleveland (Scott 10LB1-2) and Louisville (5LB1-3), all of which are very rare on cover. From the mid 1850s to 1863, regular U.S. stamps (a 1 cent plus a 3 cent stamp usually) were used on mail to indicate the carrier rate. All carrier fees were discontinued on June 30, 1863, when all U.S. letter carriers became government employees, paid a salary at an annual rate, rather than collecting fees from patrons a la carte to take mail to and from the Post Office.
