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Exposition: continued
In 1913 the last piece of postal stationary appeared in Tsarist Russia. The occasion was festive: 300 years of Romanov dynasty. A year later WW I broke out and in 1915 The Baltic area south of Riga was occupied by German troops and also for the Romanovs things did not go well.
Pict.13. Postal stationary of 3 kop. with the picture of tsar Alexander III, sent from
/ Jelgava to Sint Petersburg, 1913.During the German occupation of the Baltic area (1915-1918), the so called Postgebiet des Oberbefehlhabers Ost, the greater part of the post consisted of free postcards of German military, sent by fieldpost, and of German postal stationary of the type of Germania with the print Postgebiet/Ob.Ost.
The picture postcards again offer several opportunities in a posthistorical collection (pict. 14). I have made my own collection Ober.Ost according to the towns with a German post office; the introduction is illustrated with a picture postcard. Fieldpostcards had to have a service or unitstamp to justify that it was post-paid.(pict. 15)
Pict. 14 Picture postcard "Deutsche Artillerie in den Strassen Libaus", taken by "Hoffotograaf K?9;ewindt, K?sberg i.Pr.".
Pict. 15. 1917 post-paid postcard of "Libau" to Steyerberg near Hannover, with service stamp Lehrkursus f?izier-Aspiranten Libau * I. Bataillon.
. It is obvious that they paid no longer much attention to the secrecy of the place of dispatch.
During the German occupation 3 postal stationary were issued, strictly dependent on the postal tariffs: 5, 7 ? and 10 Pfg.
The advance of the German troops went in the years 1915-1918 in three stages. As a result the three pieces of postal stationary have or have not been used and more often or less in the area of Lithuania, Latvia or Esthonia. . The card of 5 Pfg for instance does not occur without extra postage in Riga and does not occur north of Riga because of the raise in postage to 7 ? Pfg. On 1 August 1916. But the card of 10 Pfg. was used in the whole area, but is hard to find because the postage raise did not happen until 1 October 1918.
Afb. 16 Postap stationary of 10 Pfg. with print Postgebiet / Ob.Ost van RIGA to Breslau, 26 oktober 1918.
Censured both in Riga and K?sberg.
After the defeat on the western front the German troops also had to withdraw from the Baltic area. Estonia,Latvia and Lithuania had proclaimed their independence, but it was threatened by the bolsjewic units marching up from Russia. From 1 january 1919 in the territories occupied by them there was a complete freedom of postage for cards and letters up to 15 grams (pict.17).
Pict.17 Postage free postcard from ZEHSIS to ZESWAINE, 30 April - 3 May 1919.
The datestamps are made from Russian stamps from the tsarist times. The names of the places are written in the old Lithuanian spelling. With the reforms of 1921 the way they were written changed into C糩s en Cesvaine.
The independence was of course a perfect opportunity to issue nationalist picture postcards. The firm J.Reeksts prepared a beautiful series with Lithuanian symbolism; one of the designers was A.C., who also designed the first Lithuanian stamp. Whereas on the stamps ears of corn are enveloped by the rising sun, on the card the sun warms the national tree, the oak (pict.18).
Pict. 18.
In the new, independent Baltic countries the post administrationshad great difficulties in creating their own postal service. Because of the wars and the miserable economic situation they lacked almost everything and they had to make do with stamps, paper and forms left behind from former periods (pict. 19 and 20).
Pict. 19 Russian postal stationary from the Kerenskiperiod (Michelnr. P29), used for a postagefree ecclesiastical postcard from WALMEERA to STRENTSCHI, 3-4 mei 1921.
Pict. 20 Russian postal formular card with official Latvian print PASTA KARTE ? CARTE POSTALE, from MAHLPILS to Riga, 12 april 1921.
Before the edition of postal stationary the Latvian postal services issued postal formular cards. Striking is the provisional Latvian coat of arms at the top left corner and the marked space for the stamp at the top right corner. The text in the space is: Markas uslipi- / naschanai (pict.21).
Pict. 21 Postal formular card, postagefree sent from AUMEISTERE to Smiltene, 29 jan. 1922.
In 1921 and 1922 the L.post even made an occasional postal formular cards to draw the attention to the great exhibitions organised in Riga.
The cards look striking because of the vignette and the bright red ink. The text in the top right hand corner had in the mean time been adapted to the new spelling: Markas uzlipi- / na?anai (pict. 22).
Afb. 22 Occasional postal formular card, postagefree sent from RIGA to ZEHSIS, 20 apr. 1922.
The first postal stationary appeared in Latvia in 1923. Until 1939 eleven postcards in all were published with an imprinted country coat of arms, mostly in pairs for use at home and abroad and in connection with raises of postage. In 1927 they were made larger and in 1938-1939 the design changed.
The production of postal stationaries was a number of times behind the raises, so that extra stamps had to be used. This was also done by the post when selling cards of which the postage was too low. The stamps were stuck under the image on the card to leave the writing on the card uncovered. Private persons often stuck the stamp beside the image (pict.23). Because of these ways of acting a collection of postal stationaries can be made much larger.
Pict. 23 Postal stationary of 12 santimu for foreign corresponce,with extra postage up to 15 santimu as a result of the raise in postage of 1 February. Sent from Riga to Germany, 7 Jan. 1927.
In Latvia many public bodies and organisations enjoyed free postage. The government, in all its ranks, made a lot of use of cards for making statements or getting information. Yet servicecards are not too easy to find, the receivers probably just threw them away. The following illustrated postcard of the Latvian railways (Latvijas Valsts Dzelzceli) is a very fine example (pict. 24)
Pict. 24
Pict. 25 On the backside the station of Tornakalns informs the adressed of the arrival of 61 kg of potatoes (kartupe響 from Dzelzava. RIGA, 5 maart 1938.
Both companies and private organisations used their postcards or printed cards as "visiting-cards" (pict. 26 and 27)
Pict. 26 Postal formular card of the Latvian Bible society from VALMIERA to Smiltene, 20 aug. 1940.
prepayd as postcard.
Pict. 27 Printed card of the company KⲬis Lielaucs (Charl GrearBear) from RIGA to Valmiera, 20 okt. 1938.
Prepayd as printed matter.
The two cards above show the difference in rate between a postcard with a written text, 10 santimu, and a printed card at printed matter rate, 3 santimi.
A special example shows that, cleverly making use of the possibilities, a considerable number of serious or light texts could be sent for a modest amount of money. The Literⴻras Pastkarte gave the reader 14 pages of poetry on the occasion of the New Year.(pict. 28).
Pict. 28 Booklet of postcards, nr 7 from a series, sent from ZONEPE to Kraslava, 1 januari 1938.
In 1940 the Baltic countries ended up between anvil and hammer. After the Soviet occupation of 1940-1941 followed the German one of 1941 till 1944/45. The war period brought philatellistically both small adaptations and big changes, also when using postcards.
As an illustration the following four examples.
Pict. 29 Postal formular card at a printed matter rate sent in RIGA, 14 nov. 1940. The sender has changed the name of the country in the heading of the card into the new political situation; L.P.S.R. stands for Latvian socialist soviet republic.
Pict.. 30 Postal stationary of 20 kop. of the Soviet Union used in Latvia. Sent from
/ RIGA to LIEPAJA, 18-19 april 1941.
Pict. 31 .......... , sent in Riga at local .......... The local rate of 5 pfg was introduced on 1 July 1943. Before that a local card cost the same as a national one, i.e.6 pfg. Fine example of a 5 pfg single postage(??) Bilingual printed matter postal card of the Grundst?ellschaft Lettland, sent in R·A at local postal card rate, 15 aug. 1944.
The local rate of 5 Pfg. was introduced on 1 July 1943. Before that a local card cost the same as a national one, i.e. 6 pfg. Fine example of a 5 pfg single postage prepayment.
Pict.32 Picture postcard from RIGA to Germany, 27 april 1942.
Sending picture postcards was forbidden, because between the layers of paper of which the card was made, forbidden messages might be sent. So: Zur?a unzul䳳ig.
Being part of tsarist Russia before World War 1, the Baltic governments were taken up as Soviet republics in the Soviet Union after World War 2. Posthistorically a "forgotten" period, but certainly one with a lot of intersting possibilities and in this way comparable with the time before 1915. The use of soviet postal articles in the Baltic republics is an exaple of this (pict. 33)
Pict.33 Sovjet postal stationary of 25 kop. in 1957 sent from BALVI /
to NICA / 
in the Latvian sovietrepublic.Herewith the circle is almost complete. In the present independent Baltic states postcards are still being used, for instance to send in answering- or request slips at competitions or lotteries. But these are the last convulsions of a fascinating but dying postal article.
This article is based on the speech I delivered at our meeting of 31 March 2001.
Because of the nature of my own collection I have stressed the use of postcards in LAtvia. A lot of the text can be transposed to Estonia and Lithuania and true lovers of these countries can add the peculiarities of them themselves , with charm I hope.
Literature:
Lit. 1 Michel catalogus Ganzsachen Ost Europa. On the moment not ready for delivery.
Lit. 2 A. Epstein: "Briefkaartformulieren van het post- en telegraafdistrikt Riga", in Het Baltische gebied, nr. 33, dec.1998.
Leon Nebenzahl: "Es muss nicht immer ein Wertstempel sein" (Russlands Postkarten-Formulare von 1872 bis 1926), Hamburg, 1994.
Lit. 3 R.W. van Wijnen: "Bedrukte Russische postwaardestukken gebruikt in het latere Letland", in Het Baltische Gebied, nr. 36, juli 2000.
Lit. 4 R.W. van Wijnen: "De (Rode) Letse geweerschutters, 1915-1917" in Het Baltische Gebied, nr. 22, juli 1993.