Lagos SG#14 4d Deep Bright Rose, Queen Victoria, 1876-1880 Comb Perf. 14 Crown CC Watermarked Issue, 5th Printing, A Very Fine Used Example

A very well centered and very fine used example of the 4d deep bright rose Queen Victoria De La Rue Keyplate stamp from the 1876-1880 comb Perf. 14 Crown CC issue. According to J.F Ince in his definitive work, there were a total of 57,540 stamps issued across 6 different printings between May 9, 1876 and November 18, 1880. This example is from the fifth printing from November 26, 1879, of which 6,000 stamps were printed. Printed on vertical wove paper with fine vertical mesh. Cancelled with a what appears to be a light strike of a Proud K3 9-bar Lagos bootheel killer cancel. This cancel is not known to have been in use before 1887 according to Proud, but this definitely appears, based on the narrow width of the bars to be another example.

Stanley Gibbons values a VF-75 used example at 12 pounds = $24.

I have written a blog post which explains the differences between the printings, which you can access here.

The stamp offered here grades VF-84 as follows:

Margins/centering: 44/60

Paper freshness: 5/5

Colour: 5/5

Impression: 5/5

Absence of visible paper flaws: 5/5

Perforations: 10/10

Cancellation: 10/10