Lot
2263 
1863, 2¢ black. Canceled by "1864" manuscript year date cancel on unsealed Horace I. Gray, Card & Job Printer corner card cover to Athen, Me., with matching printed "Cumberland, Me., Mar 23" double circle date stamp and manuscript day, with original circular enclosure, cover corner tear at upper left affecting corner card, otherwise Very Fine, this is one of only a very few Cumberland, Maine precancel envelopes franked with a 2¢ Blackjack, ex Rorke; with 2009 P.F. certificate. Scott No. 73 Estimate $2,000 - 3,000.
Horace I. Gray was a "Card and Job Printer" located in Cumberland, Maine offering a variety of stationery merchandise. All of the known Cumberland precancels are on cover from only two firms, that of Gray himself and the Portland firm of Sanborn & Carter. It is suggested that Gray did the printing for Sanborn & Carter, together with the mailing, thus accounting for the Cumberland precancel on the Portland firm's mail. Five distinct types of the Cumberland precancel are known. Only the last type, the double circle date stamp, has been found on the Blackjack issue, the other four types having become obsolete by the time the two cent stamp appeared in 1863.
Realized: $2,700