Gallery

 

Berlin Exchange Control Offices

Elbing cover 13.12.22 (only a poor copy of the front). It bears both 23C6 and 23C7 weight cachets. The wording of 23C6 suggests it was applied by the Elbing Post Office when they got the letter back from the inspection office. No. 23C7 is similar to weight cachets used at some other PU offices.

PP Office within a PU Office: A counter to which the public could take unsealed letters by hand for inspection, existed at Elbing (see cover 22.9.23 with Elbing * 1 h postmark). This used cachet 23C3. A similar counter probably existed at Lauenburg. No covers seen yet.

Postal Traffic with ceded zones:

Reference: mtsb1at des Reichspostininisterium Nr.2, dated 13 Jan 1920, Order Nr.3, dated 10 January 1920, “Postverk ehr mit den abzutretenden Gebieten”. Copy attached.

The Lauenburg (Pommern) Postüberwachungtel1e (PU) was set up to examine mail between Danzig and West Poland (the ceded areas of the former German Empire) and Pommern. The Elbing PU Office was set up to examine mail between Danzig and West Poland and East Prussia. They opened for business on 10 January 1920, the day the provisions of the Versailles Treaty came into force, creating Danzig as a free city and formally ceding West Poland to Poland. Of course, the province of Poznan (Posen to the Germans) had been effectively part of Poland, many months before that.

REFERENCES:

For further study on this area, see ARGE DANZIG 106 (22 Dec. 1981), “Devisenkontrolle auf Briefen von und nach Danzig” by Werner Rittmejster. This reports on a study based on 396 letters, mostly from Danzig to Germany, and mostly routed through Berlin.

 

Danzig Report Vol. 1 - Nr. 77 - October - November - December - 1992, Page 56.