GB Overprints Society

The establishment of the “Irish Provisional Government” on 16 January 1922 seemed to take the (Irish) post office by surprise. Although work must have started on designs preparatory to independence these did not appear until 6 December 1922 (the 2d “map”, which, it should be noted, includes Northern Ireland within the boundaries of Ireland). As a result, a series of temporary overprints was arranged, the first of which appeared on 17 February; these arrangements seem to have been rather hasty, as no fewer than four printers were used – Dollard and Thom for the early sets, Harrison for the coils, Government Printing Works and Harrison for the 1925-1935 “Seahorses”. Unoverprinted British stamps with Irish postmarks between 16 January and the issue of overprinted stamps attract a significant premium. In the meantime there were also a few unofficial handstamps, presumably to make a political point (see political propaganda).

Although the issues look complicated, in fact only 4 values (1½d, 2d, 6d, 1/-, in the 5-line overprint, numbers 3/29, 4/30, 5/31, 10/36, 13/40) are difficult to distinguish. There are a great many minor varieties in the lettering in all issues, and many minor re-entries on the Seahorses.

In parallel to the postage issues, all the many revenue issues also appeared with the different overprints. It is a truly complex 12 months of overprints!

British postage dues continued in use in Ireland until 1925 – since they had no country designation or King’s head they were allegedly deemed not to need an overprint. However, the nation was clearly not so anxious about the appearance of the British monarch’s head on their stamps, since the King George VI “seahorse” high values continued to be overprinted for use in Ireland until 1937, 15 years later.

In the confused and hasty hand-over of power, a remarkable bureaucratic oversight arose. Because of lax wording in the 1922 Post Office Act which gave the Irish overprinted stamps the same validity as unoverprinted ones, the Irish issues were also inadvertently rendered valid for use in any colony which used GB stamps, including (for example) Ascension. Such usage, however obviously philatelic, is keenly sought after. The anomaly was quickly corrected (Robson Lowe, 1952, p.398).

Irish Provisional Government

KGV, 1922 Overprinted by Dollard and Thom

Overprinted “Rialtas Sealadaċ na hEireann 1922” in 5 lines

Dollard – long “9” in 1922

Thom – short “9” in 1922, 14½ mm * 16 mm, dull black to grey (1½d, 2d, 6d, 1/-)

(SG №)	denomination	colour	date of issue	Printer	number issued
1	½d	Green	17/02/1922	Dollard	10,320,000
2	1d	Scarlet	17/02/1922	Dollard	26,880,000
3	1d	Carmine Red	17/02/1922	Dollard	(inc. above total)
4	2½d	Bright Blue	17/02/1922	Dollard	360,480
5	3d	Bluish Violet	17/02/1922	Dollard	1,560,000
6	4d	Grey Green	17/02/1922	Dollard	408,480
7	5d	Yellow Brown	17/02/1922	Dollard	504,000
8	9d	Agate	17/02/1922	Dollard	575,520
9	10d	Turquoise Blue	17/02/1922	Dollard	216,000
10	1½d	Red Brown	17/02/1922	Thom	960,000
12	2d (die I)	Orange	17/02/1922	Thom	9,600,000
13	2d (die II)	Orange	17/02/1922	Thom	(inc. above total)
14	6d (chalky)	Reddish Purple	17/02/1922	Thom	480,000
15	1s	Bistre Brown	17/02/1922	Thom	480,000

Varieties

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KGV, 1922 High Values (Bradbury Wilkinson) Overprinted by Dollard

(SG №)	denomination	colour	date of issue	Printer	number issued
17	2s6d	Sepia Brown	17/02/1922	Dollard	40,000
18	2s6d	Reddish Brown	17/02/1922	Dollard	(inc. above total)
19	5s	Rose Carmine	17/02/1922	Dollard	26,000
20	10s	Dull Grey Blue	17/02/1922	Dollard	20,000

Varieties

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1922 Coil stamps, overprinted by Harrison and Sons in London

Singles from horizontal coils can be distinguished from vertical coils by the guillotining of the edges: horizontal coils have the top and bottom perfs guillotined rather than torn, in the vertical coils the side edges are guillotined; many copies are guillotined badly, and used copies from horizontal coils are often also badly miscut on the vertical sides because of misaligned automatic affixing machines. The 1d came mostly from horizontal coils. The 2d die II was not issued in coils unoverprinted in the UK.

For the difference between 2d die I and die II see above: since the coils were joined from cut up sheets rather than in continuous rolls it is possible to get 2d coil joins where one stamp is die I and the other is die II, though it is obviously easy to fake these.

On the joins of vertical strips some of the vertical strips will have come from the column below which the control letter would appear in the margin used for joining the strips, but there appear to be no reports of such joins in which enough of the bottom margin remaining to show part of the control xxx check, and check whether the join used the top margin or bottom margin.

Note: the Irish printers lacked the machinery to make up the coils

overprint 15 mm * 17 mm, vertical and horizontal coils

(SG №)	denomination	colour	date of issue	Printer	number issued
26	½d	Green	19/06/1922	Harrison	236,000+
27	1d	Scarlet	19/06/1922	Harrison	690,000+
28	1½d	Red Brown	19/06/1922	Harrison	56,000+
29	2d	Bright Orange (die I)	19/06/1922	Harrison	322,000+
29a	2d	Bright Orange (die II)	Aug 1922	Harrison	393,000+

Varieties

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1922, Overprints by Thom

Change of colour of overprint

Thom took over all the overprinting but used bolder blue-black and red on selected values. The 1½d, 2d, 6d, 1/- are difficult to distinguish from the first set

(SG №)	denomination	colour	date of issue	Ink Colour	number issued
30	½d	Green	June 1922	Bold Blue Black
31	1d	Scarlet	June 1922	Bold Blue Black
32	1½d	Red Brown	June 1922	Bold Blue Black
32a	1½d	Chestnut	June 1922	Bold Blue Black
33	2d (die 1)	Orange	June 1922	Bold Blue Black
34	2d (die II)	Orange	June 1922	Bold Blue Black
35	2½d	Blue	June 1922	Bold Red
36	3d	Violet	June 1922	Bold Blue Black
37	4d	Grey Green	June 1922	Bold Red
38	5d	Yellow Brown	June 1922	Bold Blue Black
39	6d	Reddish Purple (Chalky)	June 1922	Bold Blue Black
39a	6d	Deep Reddish Purple	June 1922	Bold Blue Black
40	9d	Agate	June 1922	Bold Red
41	9d	Olive Green	October 1922	Bold Red
42	10d	Turquoise Blue	June 1922	Bold Blue Black
43	1s	Bistre Brown	June 1922	Bold Blue Black

Varieties

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KGV, 1922 High Values (Bradbury Wilkinson) Overprinted by Thom

Bolder print than earlier high values using shiny, blue black ink.

(SG №)	denomination	colour	date of issue	Printer	number issued
44	2s6d	Sepia Brown	Oct 1922	Thom	10,000
45	5s	Rose Carmine	Nov 1922	Thom	8,000
46	10s	Dull Grey Blue	Oct 1922	Thom	6,000

Varieties

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KGV, 1922 Thom wider overprint

Overprint measures 15.7 mm * 16 mm and it is not clear why Thom reset the overprint to this wider setting.

(SG №)	denomination	colour	date of issue	Printer	number issued
47	½d	Green	21/11/1922	Thom	720,000
48	1d	Scarlet	21/11/1922	Thom	1,680,000
49	1½d	Red Brown	04/12/1922	Thom	600,000
50	2d	Orange (die II)	21/11/1922	Thom	1,440,000
51	1s	Olive Bistre	21/11/1922	Thom	240,000

Varieties

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Irish Free State

On 6 December 1922 the status of the country changed to “Irish Free State” so a revised overprint was applied to the British stamps. The stamps engraved “Eire” were gradually released during 1922 and 1923, and overlapped with some of the later overprinted stamps.

(SG №)	denomination	colour	date of issue	Ink Colour	number issued
52	½d	Green	18/12/1922	Shiny Blu/Black
53	1d	Scarlet	16/12/1922	Shiny Blu/Black
54	1½d	Red Brown	21/12/1922	Shiny Blu/Black
55	2d (die II)	Orange	11/12/1922	Shiny Blu/Black
56	2½d	Bright Blue	06/01/1923	Red
57	3d	Violet	06/01/1923	Shiny Blu/Black
58	4d	Grey Green	16/01/1923	Red
59	5d	Yellow Brown	23/12/1922	Shiny Blu/Black
60	6d	Reddish Purple (Chalky)	23/12/1923	Shiny Blu/Black
61	9d	Olive Green	21/12/1922	Red
62	10d	Turquoise Blue	13/01/1923	Shiny Blu/Black
63	1s	Bistre Brown	21/12/1922	Shiny Blu/Black

Varieties

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The Irish Free State

KGV, 1922 High Values (Bradbury Wilkinson) Overprinted by Thom

Further later printing of Seahorses

(SG №)	denomination	colour	date of issue	Printer	number issued
64	2s6d	Chocolate Brown	21/12/1922	Thom
64aa	2s6d	Pale Brown	21/12/1922	Thom
65	5s	Rose Carmine	28/12/1922	Thom
66	10s	Dull Grey Blue	28/12/1922	Thom

Varieties

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KGV, 1923, Coil stamps, overprinted by Harrison in London

Coil stamps, overprinted by Harrisons in London

Note: the Irish printers lacked the machinery to make up the coils

These can be distinguished from the sheet overprints by the foot of the “1” being rounded instead of square (see illustration below), and (of course) by the edges being guillotined for use in coil machines. Most ½d, 1d and 2d stamps are in horizontal coils, most 1½d in vertical coils. The 2d die II was not issued in coils unoverprinted in the UK.

The square foot sheet stamp, round foot coil stamp, and the “long 1” variety (the latter can be found both on horizontal and vertical coils, including several of those illustrated above).

(SG №)	denomination	colour	date of issue	Printer	number issued
67	½d	Green	07/03/1923	Harrison	265,000+
68	1d	Scarlet	07/03/1923	Harrison	144,000+
69	1½d	Red Brown	07/03/1923	Harrison	23,000+
70	2d	Orange (die II)	07/03/1923	Harrison	144,000+

Varieties

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KGV, 1925 High Values (Bradbury Wilkinson) Overprinted the Government Printing Works in Dublin

Narrow date, grey black overprint

(SG №)	denomination	colour	date of issue	Printer	number issued
83	2s6d	Chocolate Brown	25/08/1925	Government printers of Dublin
84	5s	Rose Carmine	25/08/1925	Government printers of Dublin
85	10s	Dull Grey Blue	25/08/1925	Government printers of Dublin

Varieties

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KGV, 1927 High Values (Bradbury Wilkinson) Overprinted by the Government Printing Works in Dublin

Wide date (as 1922), deep black ink instead of blue-black ink

(SG №)	denomination	colour	date of issue	Printer	number issued
86	2s6d	Chocolate Brown	09/12/1927	Government printers of Dublin
87	5s	Rose Carmine	Feb 1928	Government printers of Dublin
88	10s	Dull Grey Blue	15/02/1927	Government printers of Dublin

Varieties

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KGV, 1935 High Values (Waterlow & Son) Overprinted by the Government Printing Works in Dublin

Re-engraved Seahorses

It is interesting to note that the use of high values bearing the head of the “British King” were still in use 13 years after independence.

(SG №)	denomination	colour	date of issue	Printer	number issued
99	2s6d	Chocolate Brown	March 1935	Harrison and Somerset House of London
100	5s	Bright Rose Red	March 1935	Harrison and Somerset House of London
101	10s	Indigo	March 1935	Harrison and Somerset House of London

Varieties

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References specific to this and related chapters

GBOS GB Overprints Compendium edition 8, Dr John Gledhill (12/4/2020)

Particular thanks go to Stanley Gibbons Ltd, for permission to quote their catalogue numbers and numerous other contributors who are mentioned in the Appendix section.

All content is copyright, Dr John Gledhill and the GB Overprints Society, May 2025.