Air Mail Voucher

Italian Colonies, Page AO-7 (GR-2)

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Italy entered the Second World War in June 1940. Italian East Africa (Africa Orientale Italiana, or A.O.I.) was cut off from the Italian peninsula. The only way left to move men, goods and mail was by air. New military post office cancels arrived in June 1940, numbered 1, 2 and so on (e.g., Posta Militare No. 1) at Addis Ababa. From September 1940 the number 1000 was added to each one to avoid confusion with offices elsewhere.

The “franchigia militare” (military franchise, or free postage for soldiers) stamps were of two values issued in April 1941. They were known as the “Buono Posta Aerea” (air mail voucher). They are catalogued as Sassone 1 and 2, one printed in green and the other in red, and they were issued without gum. The word “buono” means voucher, so they were presumably meant to pay for air mail rather than as ordinary postage.

The vouchers are the only stamps of Italian East Africa that show a map including British Somaliland, which Italy had annexed to the colony in 1940. The timing was bad, though. By 1941 the Italian administration was collapsing under the East Africa Campaign, and the British military administration replaced Italian stamps with their own. Pockets of Italian resistance lasted until 1943. The Buono Posta Aerea is listed as very rare today.

Note

I don’t have any of these stamps. I passed on buying any East African colony stamps for a long time, opting for the less generic more specific colony stamps like Tripolitania or Somalia. I’ll get to these one day, but not too soon.

Contains 13 spots: own 0 – 0 unused, 0 used.

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Stamp Details

The table below lists information about the stamps shown on this page of Lighthouse’s stamp album. For more details about a particular stamp, click on its description. That will take you to the related web page of Colnect.

spot

own

catalog

subject

description

comment

Stamps for Military Use

1.1		FM1	Buono Posta Aerea	(04 1941) military, yellowish green
1.2		FM2	Buono Posta Aerea	(04 1941) military, carmine

Safari Postage Due

2.1		S16	Lion Hunter on Horseback	20c (01 1942) postage due, red & pink
2.2		S15	Lion Hunter on Horseback	10c (01 1942) postage due, brownish red
2.3		S17	Lion Hunter on Horseback	30c (01 1942) postage due, red & lilac brown
2.4		S22	Lion Hunter on Horseback	2₤ (01 1942) postage due, sky blue & slate
3.1		S14	Lion Hunter on Horseback	5c (01 1942) postage due, red & grey brown
3.2		S21	Lion Hunter on Horseback	1.50₤ (01 1942) postage due, sky blue & dark grey
3.3		S20	Lion Hunter on Horseback	1₤ (01 1942) postage due, green & sky blue
3.4		S19	Lion Hunter on Horseback	75c (01 1942) postage due, reddish lilac
4.1		S18	Lion Hunter on Horseback	50c (01 1942) postage due, red & violet
4.2		S24	Lion Hunter on Horseback	10₤ (01 1942) postage due, orange & sky blue
4.3		S23	Lion Hunter on Horseback	5₤ (01 1942) postage due, light & sky blue

Footnotes

• Spot refers to the postion of the stamp on the album page (e.g., 3.2 indicates row 3, position 2).

• Amt. is an abbreviation for the face amount of the stamp.

• Own indicates the stamp status: ✓ for unused; ✗ for used or canceled; ⭑ signifies I ordered one; ; ✨ indicates it was bought recently; ✠ means an auction bid is pending; and ◎ is used, and it costs too much for unused.

• To search by catalog number, go to the search box and enter it in the catalog number box. However, it’s a bit broken; I need to fix it.