Newfoundland #12Ai 5d Venetian Red, Crown and Heraldic Flowers, 1860-1861 Pence Issue, An Extremely Fine Unused Example on Thin Soft Wove, With Watermark

A fresh and extremely fine unused example of the 5d venetian red Crown and Heraldic Flowers stamp from the 1860-1861 Pence Issue, printed on the thin, soft hand made watermarked wove paper, from the 1860 printing.

This misunderstood and often misidentified issue was printed in 4 main printings, which are listed in Unitrade as follows:

• 1857 to 1860 - dry printings made on thick, soft machine made paper with distinct mesh. This encompasses the scarlet vermilion rarities and the better 1d and 3d's, which are distinguished from what follows by shade and by dimensions, being that the design is 1/2 mm wider than the later printings.
• 1860 to July 1861 - dry printings, but now made on handmade paper that varies in thickness and has no mesh. These are listed in Unitrade as the orange stamps and the better 5dm which again is 1/2 mm wider than later printings.
• July 1861 - wet printings made on soft paper, which varies in thickness in deep shades. These are not separately listed in Unitrade, but are grouped with #15A-23. They are much scarcer than the later remainders in the pale shades, and are worth considerably more than the Unitrade prices.
• November 1861 to 1864 - wet printings, but on hard paper, which again varies in thickness, in medium to pale shades. These are the common remainders upon which Unitrade's prices are based.

The stamp offered here is one of the printings from the second period, on a thin version of the soft pape, with the "Stacy Wise 1858" papermaker's watermark in double lined letters. No gum, as often with these issues, but this is taken into account with the stated value being 1/2 the normal Unitrade price.

Unitrade does not list the watermarked stamp in this shade, which is a premium shade. The watermarked stamp in the more common violet brown shade lists for $250 in VF-75 OG. Based on the normal premium assigned for the Venetian red shade, the watermarked version should be worth $416 for VFOG. Thus VF unused should be worth $208. The stamp offered here grades XF-86 as follows:

Centering/margins: 56/70

Paper freshness: 10/10

Colour: 10/10

Impression: 5/5

Absence of visible paper flaws: 5/5

The stamp offered last week was unwatermarked.