AM POST
From planning and design to the
point of sale - and further usage.
Outline
1.) The political situation in Germany - 1944/45
1.1) Preparation and planning of the resumption of mail services in post-war Germany
1.2) Restoration of mail services in the Aachen area under Allied occupation
2)
The 3 different versions of AM POST stamps
2.1) The American edition
2.2) The English edition
2.3) The German edition
3.) The resumption of mail services after the War
3.1) Supplementary services and mail at reduced charges
4.) Packages and parcels
5.) Increased charges as of 1. March 1946
6.) Resumption of mail services between the zones
7.) Resumption of international mail services
8.) Mail for prisoners of war (POWs)
9.) Use outside the British and American Zones
9.1.) Customs union with Kleinwalsertal
9.2) Use in the Soviet Zone.
9.2.1) Redrawing of boundaries between the British and Soviet Zones
9.2.2) Temporary use of AM POST stamps by the Dresden Postal Headquarters
10.) Use of AM POST in Berlin
11.) Postal ID cards
12.) Forgeries
13.) End of over-the-counter validity and use thereafter
owener documents, ² Prof. Wigand Bruns, Die Postgeschichte von Aachen 1943 – 1948, ³ Wolfgang Strobel, Aachen-Briefe vom Februar und März 1945,
Deutscher Druck – Grundlagen für die Bearbeitung, ARGE AM POST (Monheim, Schmettkamp, Wiegand), 5 Plattenfehlerkataloge und Druckbilder der Bundesarbeitsgemeinschaft AM POST, 6 Handbuch AM POST (Bockhold, Hettler, Mücke, Schmidt, Wiegand), 7 Wolfgang Strobel, Die Aufnahme des Postverkehrs in
Deutschland nach der Besatzung 1945 bis 1950, 8 Wikipedia
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AM POST 1945 / 46
1.) The political situation in Germany 1944/45
1.1) Preparation and planning of the resumption of mail services in post-war Germany
With the collapse of Germany in 1945, its stamps were no longer valid and only stamps issued by
the Allies could be used in the American and British Zones. The Allies were convinced at a very
early stage that the war would end in their favour. As early as 1943/44 the subject of postal
services in Germany was discussed by the Allies at a series of conferences. The matter was
referred to experts of the respective countries and it was very quickly decided that new stamps
should replace the Hitler series then in circulation in Germany. As the number of stamps
required was considerable, they had to be printed in relatively secure conditions. The USA was
regarded as the safest country and so the American War Ministry via the Treasury commissioned
the Bureau of Engraving and Printing (BEP) to prepare, print and deliver stamps to Europe as
soon as possible. Planning began as early as 1943. During this phase it was decided that the new
design should bear the name and the currency of the country in which they were issued. In order
to remind the Germans that they were under a military government, the salient feature of the
stamps was to be a large "M". The landing of Allied troops in Normandy on 6 June 1944 made
the matter all the more urgent, especially as the troops were advancing faster than expected.
Before the final order for the stamps was placed, the American War Ministry had the BEP print
an unknown number of stamps to be presented to its own government and the governments of
the Allied military forces. Each of the new values (today known as Michel numbers 1 - 9) was
divided into sheets of ten and the word SPECIMEN was printed horizontally in violet on
them.These sheets were turned into books of stamps, the sheets of ten stamps being held
together by two paper clips. The stamps shown below (top left) are from such a book, hence the
remnants of paper at the left margin.
The precise date of the printing of the stamps cannot be determined. The earliest known date of
packing is August 1944. As early as October 1944 the 21 Division of the British Army with the
consent of the military authorities submitted a letter to SHAFT requesting the first delivery of
supplies of the new stamps. 59 cases containing 35,400,000 stamps arrived in Europe by ship in
November 1944 and were stored in a factory warehouse in Brussels.
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1.2) Restoration of mail services in the Aachen area under Allied occupation
By mid-September 1944, the Allied troops in the west reached and crossed the German border.
In early October fighting raged around Aachen, which became the first major German city to fall
to the Allied forces. In the city, the few remaining postal workers placed themselves at the
disposal of the military government for the purpose of re-establishing postal services.Aachen's
main post office and the majority of its employees had been evacuated to Vieneburg (Harz) on 12
September 1944. On 1 November 1944, Herr Peter Hennes was appointed Postmaster of Aachen
and given the task of re-establishing mail services as well as delivering a local newspaper, the
Aachener Nachrichten. He was ordered by Captain Paul E Griffith to set up an operational post
office in Aachen The post office in the city which had been least damaged was in Maxstraße.
After a week of clearing-up, it was put into provisional service.Postal services were due to be
resumed at the same time as the publication of the "Aachener Nachrichten". On January 20 1945,
Postmaster Hennes was informed that the first edition of the newspaper was to be published as
early as January 24 1945. The first 4-page edition of the paper appeared with a printrun of several
thousand and sold out immediately. It sold for 20 Pfennig. As of 24 January 1945 postal services
within the city were available to the authorities. There was no requirement for postal services
between the various divisions of the city council as they were all located in the same building. On
the other hand, postal services were needed between the city authorities and the general
population for the delivery of official mail. However, very few documents from this period have
been traced to date. All mail had to be submitted to the military authorities for censorship, the
Allies still being very cautious. Postal services for the general population had still not been
resumed. This changed on 19 March 1945. The military supplied the post office on Maxstraße
with the new stamps and the era of the AM POST stamps had begun.The new stamps were
handed over to the postmaster by the military. There are two versions of how many stamps were
delivered - according to one, stamps to the value of 185,000 Reichsmark were supplied; the
second source mentions a total value of 80,200 Reichsmark, denominated as follows:
400.000 stamps at 5 Reichspfennig, 330.000 stamps at 6 Reichspfennig
250.000 stamps at 8 Reichspfennig, 170.000 stamps at 12 Reichspfennig
The stamps were packed and sealed in packages of 100 sheets; below is an example of a BEP seal.
All the high-ranking members of the military authorities attended the opening ceremony of the
post office in Maxstraße, as well as members of the reinstated German authorities. In honour of
what was a special day for all those present, a commemorative sheet of stamps, the Aachener
Bogen, was issued , both as a reminder of the then situation but also as a symbol of a new
beginning.
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AM POST 1945 / 46
AACHENER Bogen, separated sheet
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The first Aachener Bogen issued by Postmaster Hennes was sent to then President of the United
States, Th. Roosevelt, who was a keen philatelist. The postmark used for franking the stamps,
AACHEN 1 19.3.45 8-9, was created by foreman Jennes of the postal workshop, as no other
postmark was available. On the same day, postal services for the civilian population within the
city of Aachen were permitted. The new AM POST stamps could be purchased over the counter
at the Maxstraße post office and later also from postmen and -women. The following types of
mail could be sent - letters and postcards from official authorities, business people, industry and
banks; postcards only were permitted for private citizens. As of 19 March 1945 mail boxes were
once again emptied; initially there were only 35 of these which were emptied once per day. All
mail had to be handed over to the military government for censorship. After it had been
censored, it was then returned to the Aachen 1 post office to be sorted for delivery. At first mail
was delivered three times per week.
The 10th edition of the Aachener Nachrichten of 28.3.1945 already described the resumption of
postal services in the city as a great success.
First week of mail services in Aachen
proves to be a great success.
Following the official opening of the first post office in occupied Germany in
Maxstraße Aachen, stamps to the value of RM 6,000 were sold in the first week and
some 5,000 letters and postcards delivered. 41 mail boxes are currently in use in the
city.
Apart form the Aachener Bogen, other commemorative documents were
produced. These, however, were never actually sent. One example is this
"Letter from the Mayor".
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AM POST 1945 / 46
At the end of March postmaster Hennes was instructed to establish post offices in the southern
part of the administrative area of Aachen. In most places, the post offices had been either severly
damaged or completely destroyed. So it was extremely difficult to re-establish even fairly regular
postal services. Even so, postal services were resumed here on 18 April 1945. At first , the post
offices sold the Aachener Nachrichten and were at the same time supplied with the first stamps.
As no vehicles were available, all mail had to be delivered by hand, so a restructuring of the
whole postal area was carried out. The 13th edition of the Aachener Nachrichten informed the
general public that postal services were again available in the southern district.
Announcement
As of 18 April 1945, postal services are again
available in the southern district of the administrative
area of Aachen - districts served are from Brand to
Gemünd. Not included are Hollerath, Hellenthal,
Losheim and Udenbret. Official mail can be carried
beyond the official area, which means that the
Aachen authorities can send mail to all districts listed
above and vice versa. Letters and postcards up to 20
gr are permitted. Charges within the area are 5Pf for
postcards, 8 Pf for letters. Postcards for official
purposes cost 6Pf and letters 12 Pf.
Mail is delivered once per week on Thursdays.
Stamps can be purchased at post offices and from
postmen and -women. Mail boxes painted blue and
marked PTT will be in use.
Mail should be addressed in the usual way; the name
of the sender should appear not on the back of the
envelope but in the top left corner on the front.
Envelopes are not to be sealed. Messages should
only be of a business or personal nature; reference to
any military matters is prohibited. Mail will be
censored to prevent this.
The Allied Military Government
At first only one vehicle was available to distribute mail. The vehicle was allocated by the military
government for this purpose. By the end of May, the following post offices or sub-post offices
were in operation : Marmagen, Schmidtheim, Blankenheim, Losheim, Hollerath, Helenthal, Sistig,
Netersheim, Urft, Schleiden, Gemünd, Einruhr, Lammersdorf, Monschau, Kalterherberg,
Eilendorf, Stolberg, Mausbach, Vicht, Zweifall, Walheim, Breining, Roetgen, Kornelimünster,
Brand, Kall Vetschau and Aachen City.
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At the end of May 1945, postal services were resumed in the northern district of the
administrative area of Aachen, which until then had been suspended. Conditions in this district
were even more difficult, as many of the places had been completely destroyed. Full services had
been restored by mid July 1945.
Local postcard from Aachen, 01.06.1945
On 5 July 1945, a new ID was issued for Peter Hennes. This ID was in 3 languages, English,
French and German.
On 14 July 1945 the military government was informed that the following post offices were open
for business: Wehr, Tüddern, Höngen, Heinsberg, Dremmen, Lindern, Bracheln, Baal and
Erkelenz.
On 22 July these offices opened: Dalheim-Rödgen, Niederkrüchten, Wegberg, Linnich, Löenich,
Holzweiler, Ameln, Jülich, Inden and Aldhoven. With that, the whole administrative area of
Aachen once again enjoyed full postal services.
By the end of August 1945, 4 post offices once again operated in Aachen - the main office,
Aachen 1 in Maxstraße, Aachen-Forst, Rothe Erde and Kapuzinergraben. The opening of a
further office in Dammstraße was planned for 1 September 1945.
At about the same time, postal services became available all over Germany, at first only for main
and regional offices and later within the occupied areas. Inter- zone services did not resume until
autumn 1945.
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2. The 3 different print versions of AM POST stamps
Three different versions of AM POST stamps were issued and sold at post offices in 1945. The
first of these was the American print, as it had already been printed in the USA in 1944. This has
been briefly described in section 1.1. The American stamps were sold in both the American and
British zones. On the other hand, the British and German prints were used solely in the British
zone.
The three versions can be clearly and simply identified by a number of features.These features are
exemplified below by the enlargements of the stamps. All stamps with broad perforation are
from the American print (Ill. 11) or the German print (Ill. 13). All the stamps with finer
perforations are from the British print (Ill. 12).
Ill. 11
American Print
Ill. 12
London Print
Ill. 13
German Print
All stamps from the German print show a small white triangle in the upper right corner of the
ornamentation (Ill. 14); as a rule this is clearly visible. In the lower right-hand part of the
ornamentation, the German stamps have a vertical white strip (Ill. 15); these two features are not
present in the American print.
Ill. 14
American Print
Ill. 15
German Print
The English print only includes the following values - 3, 4, 5, 6, 8 and 12 Pfennig. The American
print has 3, 4, 5, 6, 8, 12, 15 and 25 Pfennig. The German print has all of the values included in
the American print plus 1, 16, 20, 24, 30, 40, 42, 50, 60, 80 Pfennig as well as 1 Reichsmark. The
stamps of the German print are also in various sizes - the values from 1 Pfennig to 25 Pf. are
small in size; those between 30 Pf and 80 Pf are medium sized, while the 1 Reichsmark stamp is
large format.
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2.1 The American Print
As mentioned in section 1.1, page 2, the American stamps were printed in the USA and packed
and made ready for transport to Europe. During the printrun, various types of paper were used.
The first stamps were printed on smooth white paper of different thicknesses. Today the
catalogues show these types of paper as "x" and "y" paper. In the early printing phase, the 5 and
6 Pf stamps were printed on y paper. In the second printing phase, all values except the 5 Pf
stamp were printed on x paper; in the final printing phase, all denominations were printed on a
coarser, milky paper. This paper is known as z paper. The gum of the stamps is white to
yellowish.
One print sheet comprised 4 counter sheets. A counter sheet has 100 stamps, arranged 10 by
10.Between the counter sheets there were gutters some 10 mm wide with cutting lines to facilitate
separation of the sheets.
The upper and lower margins show the margin inscription and the plate number. These plate
numbers are the same as those in the order placed by the American Treasury with the BEP in
Washington. This explains the 3 different plate numbers on the 12 Pf stamps.
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Printing was done under extreme time pressure as the AM POST stamps were needed much
sooner than originally thought. This gave rise to a number of errors and variations, both in the
printing and perforation.
During the print run, or sometimes even during the manufacture of the printing plates, damage
occurred. As a result, plate flaws and image errors can be detected throughout more or less the
whole series.
Below is a small selection of plate flaws with Michel catalogue numbers.
Mi-Nr. 1 I
Mi-Nr. 7x I
(früher Druck)
Mi-Nr. 5 I
Mi-Nr. 7z I
(später Druck)
Hier kann man sehr deutlich erkennen, wie sich Plattenfehler im Laufe des Druckvorganges auf der Druckplatte verändern konnten. Links ist die Linie unter dem HLA
von DEUTSCHLAND dünn und beschädigt, rechts ist der Bruch der Linie komplett.
Links ist der Plattenfehler in einem frühen Stadium des Druckes zu sehen, der Druck
erfolgte auf x-Papier und kann somit der ersten Druckperiode zuordnet werden. Rechts
wurde aber auf z-Papier gedruckt und ist daher eindeutig aus der zweiten Druckperiode.
The inscriptions in the margin were written by typewriter before being put onto the photographic
film used in the manufacture of the printing plates. In this way, certain orthographic errors crept
in which were not corrected or touched up later, thus leading to errors in the margin inscriptions.
stamps instead of Stamps
P.ostage instead of Postage
Today we have no way of finding out why these errors were not corrected. Presumably, they were
discovered too late or it was decided not to destroy the printed stamps due to the urgent demand
for them. After all, the errors were "only" in the margin.
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AM POST 1945 / 46
During the printrun, so-called doubling of the image on the stamp occurred. This variation looks
very like a double impression. As offset printing was employed, no doubling was possible. The
sheets cannot have passed through the printing press twice.
The ink was transferred from the printing plate to the paper by means of a rubber blanket. If the
tension on the blanket was not correct or it had loosened, it might happen that ink was applied to
the paper twice (doubling).
Folds occurred as a result of incorrect or inaccurate feeding of the paper into the printing press.
The paper became wrinkled or folded between the print cylinders and the folds were printed on.
Flaws which occurred during the manufacturing of the paper may also have caused folds. These
were only discovered after the printed paper had been smoothed out.
An offset impression on the rubber is a mirror image of the normal stamp. These images
occurred as a result of the ink used for previous sheets not having dried properly and the next
sheet was placed on wet ink.
In addition to the full offset impression shown here, partial impressions also sometimes
occurred. This might happen if an additional piece of paper found its way between the sheets of
stamps, thus preventing the complete transfer of the ink. Another reason might be that the
machines sometimes operated without paper. The ink would then be passed from the rubber
blanket to the transport cylinder below and thence to the underside of the following sheet. As
the machines had a safety feature to prevent operation without paper, this is only a theoretical
possibility.
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When printing was complete, the sheets were first perforated and then divided into 4 counter
sheets. Various types of errors occurred both in the perforation and in the cutting of the sheets,
some more frequent than others.
Faulty perforation occurred when the sheet was placed inaccurately in the perforator. The
perforation was sometimes shifted only a little, sometimes substantially, even to such an extent
that it went through the middle of the stamp. This could also happen vertically, horizontally or
diagonally. It might also happen that the perforation was omitted completely or sheets were only
partially perforated.
Stamps with gutters were created as a result of inaccurate cutting. As mentioned earlier,
perforation was carried out before cutting and so errors which had occurred during perforation
were impossible to correct subsequently.
Gutters may occur on all four sides of the stamps as the sheets could slide in any direction during
the cutting process, sometimes so much so that part of the stamp opposite is visible in the gutter.
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