Lot# 9087

According to regulations, airmail surcharge was exempt but surface postage was required; the cover was therefore treated as postage due and struck with “Postage Due T” markings. Upon arrival in Shanghai on May 12, 1949, the post office affixed Gold Yuan stamps totaling $158,000 (equivalent to approximately 4 fen Silver Yuan at the prevailing conversion rate) to collect the deficiency, with triangular postage due handstamps and manuscript indication of the amount due. The addressee apparently refused delivery, and the cover was subsequently marked “Cancelled” and returned, arriving back in Tsingtao on Jun 16, 1949, by which time it had come under Communist control. The cover bears Dr. SYS Gold Yuan stamps together with surcharged revenue issues, and is struck with multiple postage due and cancellation markings, clearly illustrating the transitional postal practices during the changeover between Nationalist and Communist administrations. The round-trip routing across both postal systems, combined with the coexistence of military mail privilege and postage due treatment, makes this a very rare and important postal history item, of significant value for the study of post-war postal transition, military mail regulations, and postage due handling. Accompanied by a 2002 Experts & Consultants Limited certificate.