TAIWAN PROVINCE - JAPAN - 1945 **RARE** FIRST DAY COVER

Description

TAIWAN PROVINCE - JAPANESE POSTAGE STAMPS WITH OVERPRINT - 1945
VERY RARE FIRST DAY COVER
Stamps Issued: 4 November 1945
Postmarks on both sides on the cover indicate "43.2.19"
HISTORY:
In 1895 China ceded Taiwan to Japan. The Taiwanese reacted by establishing the short-lived Republic of Formosa, which issued its own stamps.
Under Japanese rule, Taiwanese mail was handled as part of the
Japanese
postal system. After the surrender of Japan to the Allies in August 1945, the Taiwanese postal system continued to operate locally.
On 21 October 1945, the postal system issued 3-sen and 5-sen stamps, the design consisting of a large numeral and the imperial chrysanthemum.
On 25 October 1945, Taiwan was returned to China.
On 1 November 1945, the Communication Department of the then Chief Administrations Office in Taiwan organized the Post and Telegraph Controlling Committee responsible to take over from the Japanese the Postal and Telegraph Administration in Taiwan.
As Chinese postage stamps had not yet arrived in Taiwan, Japanese postage stamps were surcharged in No. 5 Sung characters reading
〝中華民國臺灣省〞
(Taiwan Province of the Republic of China) which were overprinted locally in two vertical lines (Read from right to left on the stamp).
These locally printed stamps went on sale 4 November 1945
.
The whole set consists of nine denominations. The stamps valued from 3 Sen to 1 Yen were in Arabic Figures design.
The overprinted stamps were sold at their original value and continued to be used even after the establishment on 5 May 1946, of the Taiwan Post and Telegraph Head Office. Sale was suspended, however, in October 1946, as soon as surcharged stamps for use in Taiwan arrived from the mainland.
The original stamps were printed with gum plates by the Taiwan Publication Press in the later period of World War when Japanese fleets had mostly been annihilated and the supply of stamps from Japan was not forthcoming. The paper used for stamp printing was coarse and inferior in quality and varied in thickness and color. The surcharge work was done by the Taiwan Chao Hsiang Printing Works (
臺灣照像印刷工場
).
Throughout 1946, stocks of Chinese stamps were overprinted with new values in Sen and "for use in Taiwan only". This was followed by an issue in March 1947 marking Chiang Kai-shek's 60th birthday; four small characters in the background say "for Taiwan only". Subsequent stamp issues followed the same pattern through 1948.