almost circular obliteration lettered P.O.A. (Post Office, Africa) with the number 43, a bracket at each side and two thick bars at top and at bottom.

Type 11 (Fig. 31). Used in travelling post offices (T.P.O.), struck in black or violet. The travelling post offices are "EAST NO. 1," "MIDLAND," "WESTERN," and "NORTHERN."

32

Type 12 (Fig. 32). For fixed army post offices in Orange River Colony and Transvaal, used from about the end of 1901 and for a short time after the declaration of peace.

32A.

A fancy type of town postmark is shown in Fig. 32A.

Another interesting postmark relic of the war in South Africa is one struck in red "RECOVERED FROM WRECK OF MEXICAN" a ship which was returning from South Africa with mails from the troops, and which foundered after collision with the ss. Winkfield. The bulk of the mail was recovered.

The Great War, 1914. The Army Postal Service with the British Expeditionary Force on the Continent in the present war is under the command of Colonel W. Price, C.M.G., who as Captain Price had the long experience of service with the Army Post Office in South Africa. It is scarcely necessary to say that the volume of correspondence now being dealt with by the service is unprecedented in the history of the British Army. In the early months of the war the outgoing mail to the Army Base Post Office in France averaged 12,000 parcels and 250,000 to 300,000 letters a day. It is impossible to give statistics of the number of branch offices of all grades established, but already there are many interesting postmarks originating with the British Army in France.

The various types of marks so far recorded are:—

Army Base Post Office (Fig. 33).

Advance Base Post Office (Fig. 34).

33     34

Army Post Offices with the Troops (Figs. 35-37).

35     36     37

There are also a number of types of Censor marks, not all necessarily military, and printed labels used in re-sealing opened letters (Figs. 38-40):