ISBN 978-1-913015-32-9

The existence of British postal stationery envelopes and newspaper wrappers with added rings or collars was known from the early days of collecting, in the 1860s, and spaces were specifically provided in a number of contemporary printed albums. Approaches for collars to be added to stamped to order postal stationery had been made to the Inland Revenue in 1857, by W. H. Smith & Son and other distributors of publications. The first collars to be officially registered for use in October 1857 were for Stevens & Norton and Smith Elder & Co., and eight other companies followed between 1859 to 1863. The precise rationale for the use of these collars appears to have been for security / advertising, but it is striking that the three major users, Smith Elder & Co., W. H. Smith & Son and Grindlay & Co., only used them for overseas mail. These companies also had dispensation from the Post Office to dispatch mail directly to the main London railway stations, often using special pre-cancellations.

These ‘Official’ collars were printed together with the embossed postage dies in one operation, the colour of the collar thus being identical to the stamp. Between 1863 to 1894 some fifty other companies subsequently copied the idea, creating ‘Unofficial’ or private collars. Because these collars had to be printed at a second operation after stamping, contrasting colours to the embossed stamp dies were quite often used. Some users were philatelic companies, who produced a range of values for sale to collectors, but most were not, their primary being to advertise the business of the user. These private collars were accepted by the Post Office alongside the ‘Official’ ones, but although the dispensation for the use of collars was withdrawn in 1888, some companies continued using private collars into the mid 1890s.

The primary objective in producing this publication, is to consolidate the existing information about the use of these collars, a practice only adopted by very few other countries. Following the Introduction, which illustrates the range of embossed postage dies and the types of ‘Official’ collars used, images of the of the Inland Revenue registration records are published for the first time. The companies which officially registered their collars are then described in chronological order of registration first, followed by the ‘Unofficial’ / Private collars created by other organisations which are listed alphabetically. An Appendix gives a detailed listing of the dates of printing of the three major users and is followed by a brief valuation guide and bibliography.

Alan Huggins  MBE, RDP, Hon FRPSL

ALAN HUGGINS first became interested in postal stationery in 1952 while still at school. Progressively concentrating on this area over the years at the expense of other collections of adhesive stamps and postal history, he built highly specialised and very comprehensive collections of Great Britain, British Levant, Mauritius and Sweden as well as representative selections from other countries. He has displayed or exhibited various sections of these collections locally, nationally and been awarded F.I.P. International. Large Gold medal awards for multiple exhibits.

He has been widely involved in philately, at society, national and international levels, and is a Signatory to the Roll of Distinguished Philatelists. A Past President of the Great Britain Philatelic Society, the Postal Stationery Society, and The Royal Philatelic Society London, of which he is a Honorary Fellow and past Curator of the Society’s philatelic collections. He has previously served as Chairman of the British Philatelic Trust, and was also Chairman of Stamp World London 90. Internationally he was closely involved in the formation of the Federation of European Philatelic Associations (FEPA), and is now an Honorary President. A F.I.P. Juror for many years, and a former President of the F.I.P. Postal stationery Commission, he was awarded the F.I.P. Medal For Service in 2004.

Over the years he has written extensively about postal stationery, both in numerous articles, and as author or joint author of British Postal Stationery (1970); Specimen Stamps and Postal Stationery of Great Britain (with Marcus Samuel 1980); The Telegraph Stamps and Stationery of Great Britain 1851–1954 (with Peter Langmead 2003); Collect British Postal Stationery (with Colin Baker 2007); Great Britain, The 1840 Prepaid Parliamentary Envelopes (with Edward Klempka 2013); The Mulready Postal Stationery (with Alan Holyoake 2015); and The 1840 Embossed Wyon-Whiting Essays (with Tony Wicks 2021).

Foreword
Preface
Contents
Notes for readers & Acknowledgements
Introduction
Registration of 'Official' Collars
'Official' Collars - Overprinted Specimen
'Official' Collars - Issued items listed chronologically by date of registration
Stevens & Norton
Smith Elder & Co.
Henry King & Co.
J.F. Pawson
Saunders Otley & Co.
British Workman
W.H. Smith & Son
The Home News Grindlay & Co.
Samuel Allsopp & Sons
C.N. Borne & Son
'Unofficial' Private Collars - Issued items listed alphabetically
James Adams & Son
Ralph Allison & Sons
Alldays & Onions Ltd.
Armstrong & Co.
W.&T. Avery
A.G. Baylis & Sons
Browne, Rosenheim & Co.
Chalmers, Guthrie & Co.
W. Chillingworth & Son
Collier & Company
The County Club
Robert Dawson
William Exley & Sons
George Farmiloe & Sons
J.H. Fenner & Co.
W .B. Fordham & Son Hatton Garden
W .B. Fordham & Son York Road
W .B. Fordham & Sons York Road
Goodall's Russian Oils
William Hogarth
The Horton Ice Cream Co
International Fur Store
Thos. Lea & Co
.Lewis & Wright
Lewis & Wright & Baylis
William Lincoln
J. Lumley & Co.
The Marble Sparkling Water Works
Frank E. Millar
Office of the Philatelic Quarterly
Parkins & Gotto
William Paul
William Paul & Son
The Phoenix Gas Light & Coke Company
Pollex & Co.
George Prior
Publishers of the Permanent Stamp Album
H. Santer & Sons
Savory and Moore
Robert Scott & Co
T. Sheppard
S.W. Silver Co.'s Circular
Herbert A. Smith
Spenser, Whatley & Underhill
Henry Squire & Company
Stafford Smith & Smith
Wm. Stock & Co.
James Vancaillie
Victoria College
J. Watkin & Son
Martin Wells & Co.
Young & Stockall
Postscript
Appendix A Printing dates of larger users
Valuation Guide
Bibliography and Provenance
Index

I first became aware of the existence of advertisings rings on British postal stationery in the late 1950s and in conjunction with developing my collection, started to gather information about them. In fact, apart from Bertram McGowan's 1934 articles in the British Philatelist, I discovered that relatively little had been written about them. Their existence was mentioned, in somewhat disparaging terms, by Philbrick and Westoby in 1881, and rather sparse listings were published by Moens and Jeff , while 'Stanley Gibbons 1897 Postal Stationery Catalogue' ,or Bright & Sons 1908 Catalogue of Postcards, Envelopes etc. do not mention them at all. However, Walter Morley's 1897 Catalogue and Price List of Stamps of Great Britain', gives a more extensive listing arranged by face value, which was slightly extended by Lowe. The McGowan listing gives more detailed information and was the first to clearly separate the firms with Official rings from those who added them privately, often in contrasting colours.

Over the next few years, by generously being given access to the collections and stocks of a number of collectors and dealers, including Dr S. Ascher, Dr John Harrison, Michael Lockton, Harry Nissen, Angus Parker, Marcus Samuel, Andy Welsh, Marcus White, and Martin Willcocks I was able to assemble a more detailed listing, which was published in the GB Journal in 1965 and 1966. A slightly scaled down version of this listing was included as an appendix in British Postal Stationery 12 published in 1970 by the Great Britain Philatelic Society, and this formed the basis for the list included in the 1976 Second Edition of Higgins & Gage World Postal Stationery Catalogue, and the 'Advertising Rings' booklet published in 2000 by Richard Arundel 16.

In 2007,' Collect British Postal Stationery' by myself and Colin Baker, and published jointly by the Great Britain and Postal Stationery Societies, included a separate section with specific catalogue numbers. These are also used as the basis for classification in the present work, which brings together the results of over sixty years of study and collecting this visually attractive, and philatelically interesting, aspect of British Postal stationery. A few other countries also adopted/allowed this practice, most notably the United States, with New South Wales, Saxony, South Australia and Belgium producing only a few examples.

One unusual feature of collecting this area is, that because of the contemporary approach by early collectors was to fill the specific spaces provided in the early printed albums, it is often necessary to accept cut outs. In many cases this practice of only retaining the area containing the stamp image, resulted in few if any, entire wrappers or envelopes surviving.

The primary objective in producing this publication, is to create a visual record of this material, much of which is of significant rarity and seldom seen. One of the major problems in sourcing illustrations, was that in some instances coloured electronic versions were not available, and in one or two cases, of necessity, black and white photographs or photocopies have had to be used.

Obviously over the years a significant number of people have assisted with this project and their contributions are gratefully acknowledged on page xiii. However, there is one person whose help has been invaluable to me during the period of preparation of the final electronic product for printing, who deserves specific mention. Thus, I would like to express a very special thank you to John Barker, Editor of the Postal Stationery Society Journal, who has laboured long and hard integrating the illustrations into my text layouts. Finally, I very much hope all those who use the end result will find it both an informative, and useful addition to the literature on the subject