Not Scott listed, but it is mentioned in Scott under Latvia -- see Stamps Issued Under Russian Occupation.
1919 Western Army issue, set of 8, exists both perforate and imperforate. Reprints and counterfeits exist. I believe they are assigned catalog numbers in Michel. If you need that, I or someone else can check.
Your stamp appears to be genuine, and it does not appear to be a reprint to me. But I am open to correction.
Thanks khj, that ties in with what I thought I knew, but when I looked, the only listings I could find for the western army, were overprinted Latvia stamps.
"Stamps in the above type (illustrated as yours), 5, 10, 15, 20, 30, 50, 60 and 75k, were prepared for use by the force raised by Col. Avalov-Bermondt in Latvia, but were never issued. Forgeries also exist."
As ever, Gibbons has not checked its annotations, presumably made shortly after the event. 'Col. Avalov-Bermondt' was in fact Major-General Pavel Bermondt-Avalov.
Bermondt-Avalov, musician, adventurer, descended from Georgian princes, anti-communist, Nazi prisoner, Yugoslav exile and finally ancient New Yorker (d.1974 at the age of 97) was indeed a colourful character! Short of funding from his German backers, he printed his own money (and presumably those stamps, too). As you would. Those 8 stamps are an excellent window into a turbulent and confused period. With the recent Lithuanian issue of a civil-defence document in the event of Russian incursion, we should not think it could not happen again.
Thanks for the history, Ian! That just made an interesting stamp, just that much more so.
I hate having to wonder if it's a forgery, but from what I can tell, it's value wouldn't really warrant having it checked out. Then there's that aspect of having the higher denomination, it always makes me want to seek out the rest of the set. Then you have to worry about those being forgeries and so on and so forth. I'll probably just mount it in the Latvia section, with a footnote to it's history and go on to the next stamp.
Nigel, your first post is very reassuring, thank you. Your second post has me thinking about creating an exhibition page with a full write up on these stamps and trying to find the rest of the set.
Thank you for that too?
WB
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