A few Hs - Hatch Beauchamp, Henstridge, Holford, Huish-Champflower

As you may have gather from the previous posts, I'm catching up with some recent acquisitions in alphabetical order ... and I've got to Hatch Beauchamp.  The Letter Card below has "HATCH BEAUCHAMP / TAUNTON.SOMERSET" double circle double-blob cancels (not sure what the approved terminology is for these cancels) and is posted on the first day of issue of the 1½d KGVI stamp.

This next item from Henstridge also looks philatelic, being an Air Letter posted within Henstridge in September 1957.

I don't understand the postal markings on this next item from Holford to London - it has a "HOLFORD / BRIDGWATER . SOMERSET" double circle double line arc cancel dated September 1958 (aka a 'Birmingham' cancel after the first place to be issued with them) and it has a "MINEHEAD / SOMERSET" unified machine cancel dated June 1959.  I don't understand the two postmarks with just the one stamp.

And finally a Valentine envelope posted from Huish-Champflower to Corfe with a faint partial "HUISH-CHAMPFLOWER" udc as well as transit marks from Wiveliscombe, Wellington and Taunton, all dated February 1857.

Haselbury (Plucknett) boxed "No.4" in 1836

The entire below was from Haselbury to Shaftesbury, dated November 1836 inside, and has a boxed "No.4" receiving house handstamp.  Haselbury was in both the Crewkerne and Yeovil Penny Posts.  

Judging by the postal charge of 8d, which would have been 1d for the Penny Post and 7d in the General Post for 30-50 miles, the letter must have gone via Crewkerne.  Crewkerne to Shaftesbury is just over 30 miles (so 7d in the General Post) while Yeovil is only a bit over 30 miles (which would have been 6d for 20-30 miles).

Exford (1939) and Freshford (1936)

The postcard below is from Exford to Smethwick in August 1939 - "Could you please send my raincoat and bathing costume on ...".  A month later WW II had started.

The cover below was sent from Freshford to Adderbury and then redirected to Malvern in July 1936.  Nothing particularly special about this apart from having a Freshford cancel which I was missing.

Fivehead Climax rubber skeleton, 1913

Climax rubber skeleton cancels are quite rare - here is a "FIVEHEAD / TAUNTON" cancel dated 13th December 1913.

Fivehead had a previous climax rubber skeleton cancel in November 1907.

Some Ds - Dowlish Wake, Downside Abbey & Dunball

A trio of covers from places starting with D - first a registered letter from Dowlish Wake in August 1972 sent by John Worrall, a source of many similar covers.

The cover below has a commemorative cancel from Downside Abbey in March 1997.  A post office opened in Downside Abby in November 1998 (replacing Statton-on-the-Fosse) and closed in 2003 (I'm looking for an example of a postmark from that period).

The final example is a registered letter from Dunball to Yugoslavia in December 1950, unfortunately with quite poor cancels.

Dunster 1806 and 1831 - both costing 7d

Some entires from Dunster costing 7d to post, the first from June 1806 is from Dunster to Chard when 7d was the postal rate for 50-80 miles.  It looks as if the route would have been Dunster - Taunton - Somerton - Yeovil - Chard, a route of about 70 miles (rather than the more direct Dunster - Taunton - Ilminster- Chard which would have only been around 40 miles).  The letter has a smaller boxed mileage mark rather than the larger lined one known from 1810.

The second set are from Dunster to near Wiveliscombe, the first one dated to December 1831.  Both have framed "Dunster / Penny Post" handstamps (known 1830-1831) with manuscript "7" for postage.  Dunster to Wiveliscombe via Taunton is around 33 miles and would have been 7d in the General Post between 1813 and December 1839 for 30-50 miles.  This does not leave anything for a 'Penny Post' charge.  Maybe they just used the first handstamp that came to hand ?

Dulverton mileage without the mileage (1813) and a 3VOS and Single Ring handstamp (1871)

 Dulverton had a boxed "DULVERTON / 187" mileage mark, in use from 1801-1816.  The example below from March 1813 has the handstamp without the boxed mileage registering - for a while I thought I'd found a new handstamp !

This second Dulverton item has a blurred "803" 4-bar vertical oval single cancel and a "DULVERTON" 20mm single ring handstamp on the reverse dated May 1871.  The handstamp was issued in November 1858.

Climax Rubber cancels from Donyatt and Drayton

From 1890 into the 1920s, Climax rubber cancels were prevalent in village post offices.  The cancels always had a date across the middle in a 'day MMM. YY' format. The early ones were in violet ink while later ones were in black.  Severely distorted cancels occur when the wrong ink had been used by the postmaster.  [Annoyingly some eBay sellers refer to this type of cancel as 'skeletons', a pain when you want to search for real 'skeletons'].

Here are a couple of examples, the first is from Drayton in violet in 1907.

Th second is from Donyatt in black in May 1920.

More Cs - Claremont (Weston-super-Mare) and Crewkerne

Firstly a registered envelope from Claremont, Weston-super-Mare - it is difficult to find postmarks from Town Sub-Offices and this has a nice single ring cancel, plus uses a blank Weston-super-Mare registration etiquette with the TSO number (2) filled in by hand.

Other things that are sometimes difficult to find are Skeleton cancels - some are quite common but others not.  Here is a "CREWKERNE" 23mm skeleton cancel, known used from 29th April to 10th May 1909.  The postcard has a small railway triangular mark which I cannot decipher - others I have seen have been associated with mis-sorts.  Or it may be to do with the postcard's passage to Bidford in Warwickshire that had been a Railway Sub Office up to 1905 ?