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1932

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Imprinted Postcards

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Official Postcards & Stationary

Imprinted Postcards Issued by The Post Office of Manchukuo

From 1st March 1932 Manchukuo issued a series of "imprinted" postcards, (this means prepaid cards that had the image of the necessary stamp printed directly onto the card by the Post Office). These cards fell into three main groups, domestic cards, cards for foreign mail and cards printed for use between Manchukuo and China. For part of the time, until 1937, there was also a "local" card, which meant that for 1f you could send a card within any of the main cities.

The basic cards were usually 140mm x 90mm landscape in format, or 90mm x 140mm portrait. They were printed using offset lithography, on a medium weight, yellow, cream or buff coloured card. Reply paid cards, folded were the same size as normal cards and open measured 180mm x 140mm. In addition to plain imprinted cards a range of picture postcards became available, issued by Post Offices, also with imprinted stamps.

Postcard prices underwent many changes over the short period of the existence of Manchukuo, whenever a change took place, cards were often up-rated (or down-rated) by the Post Office to conform to the new price, in order to use up old stock. This was done in two different ways, by the use of a surcharge (as with stamps) or by the addition of a postage stamp to bring it in line with the correct postal rate.

Standard Postcard Rates

1½ fen

First Regular Issue Postcards - 26th July 1932 replaced 1935-8

The initial supply of post cards for the Manchukuo Postal Service came from Tokyo, printed by the Imperial Japanese Printing Bureau. In 1933 additional stock of the 1f and 2f standard postcards were produced at the Manchukuo Central Bank printing works at Mukden. The cards from Tokyo have the horizontal characters aligned with the centre of the imprinted stamp, whereas those printed in Mukden have the horizontal characters level with the top of the imprinted stamp. Reply paid cards and the 15f card all originate from Tokyo. All the designs are based upon the "First Regular Issue" of postage stamps.

26th July 1932  1f Local Rate Postcard (Printed in Tokyo) - The Post Office operated a Local service within a city for postcards costing 1 fen and these were pre-printed with this rate. If being sent outside of the city an additional 1 fen stamp was needed. To see a nice example of a local postcard in commercial use click here.

The eight characters at the top of the card, written horizontally, read (right to left) - "Manchu State Postal Service  Postal Card". The vertical line of 11 characters reads "Write the name and address on the right hand side".

26th July 1932  1f Local Rate Postcard (Printed in Mukden) - Above is a used example of the Mukden printing, note that the eight large characters line up with the top of the imprinted stamp and because of this the centre dividing line is longer. Both examples are on identical cream card.

26th July 1932  1f + 1f Reply Paid Postcard, above are both parts of this card, the top copy is for use by the sender and below the reply section used by the recipient.  (Printed in Tokyo).

The characters used on the top copy this card are similar to the above, but with the additional 8 vertical characters which read "Attached card is for reply". The bottom copy has an extra character in the horizontal heading "Manchu State Postal Service Reply Paid Postal Card".

26th July 1932 2f Postcard (Printed in Tokyo) for domestic use and for mail to Japan and China (China would also charge the recipient 4c postage due because they did not recognise the Manchukuo Post Office and considered its stamps invalid).

26th July 1932 2f + 2f Reply Paid Postcard (Printed in Tokyo) for domestic use and for mail to Japan and China.

26th July 1932  15f Postcard (Printed in Tokyo) for foreign destinations hence the "Carte Postale". The characters read (from right to left) Manchukuo Post Office Postal Card. It is interesting to note that the imprinted stamp on this card shows the White Pagoda and not Pu Yi, as appears the postage stamp of the same value.

Price Changes 1st March 1934

On 1st March 1934 postal prices were reduced but only overprinted versions of the 2f card (both Tokyo and Mukden printings) were available for purchase on this date. The overprint consists of 6 characters, the characters on the left being the denomination 1½f; the two characters on the right meaning "temporary use". The reply paid version of this card also had an overprint applied.

These overprints exist in many variations (see below) and the overprinting work was done in the major cities of Hsinking, Mukden and Harbin. Hard black overprints appear to have been made typographically and the softer black overprints may be the result of a rubber stamp. A soft red hand-stamped overprint is known to exist on cards printed in Mukden only - see below. (I have assigned types "a" to "f" to the examples below on a purely arbitrary basis).

1st March 1934  1½f Surcharge on 2f 1932 postcard (Card printed in Tokyo).

Type a. Hard black surcharge - height of surcharge 14.1mm (Card printed in Mukden).

Type b. Hard black surcharge - height of surcharge 12.3mm (Card printed in Tokyo).

Type c. Hard black surcharge - height of surcharge 12.5mm, top right character missing (Card printed in Mukden). This card was sent from Mukden to Hsinking.

Type d. Soft black surcharge - height of surcharge 14mm (Card printed in Mukden).

Type e. Watery black surcharge - height of surcharge 12.8mm approx (Card printed in Mukden).

Type f. Hard black surcharge - height of surcharge 13.2mm approx (Card printed in Mukden).

Type g. Red surcharge - height of surcharge 12.7mm approx (Card printed in Mukden).

March/April 1934  1½f Postcard for domestic use and for mail to Japan. There is also a reply paid version of this card - see below.

March/April 1934  1½f + 1½f Reply Paid Postcard for domestic use and for mail to Japan. Note that the reply card is almost identical to the normal 1½f postcard. The difference is the length of the vertical dividing line which continues well below the last character.

March/April 1934  6f Postcard for all overseas destinations, excluding Japan and China. There is also a reply paid version of this card.

New Format 1st November 1934

The main reason for the issue of these new cards was the renaming of the state "Manchu Empire", this results in the change of heading seen below, now reading "Manchu Empire Postal Service Post Card". The vertical line of 11 characters continues to read "Write the name and address on the right hand side" as before.

The Post Office changed the format of all domestic postcards from the Chinese style landscape format to portrait. These were better suited to Japanese calligraphy (by this time Japanese was the language being taught in schools). Postcards to foreign destinations, excluding Japan, would remain in landscape format.

 Three cards were issued at this time, a 1f x 1f reply paid postcard, a 1½f postcard and a 1½f x 1½f reply paid postcard. Both a 1f postcard and a 6f postcard were to be included in this format but for some reason these were never issued.

A note on a card in my collection states that these cards were produced by the Ukrainian Publishing Company, Harbin. Further research would be needed to confirm this.

1st November 1934  1f + 1f Reply Paid Card (front and back shown above). These were printed on cream card (listed) and buff (unlisted) and the card illustrated is an example of a minor variety reported by Spalding.

The last character shown above is out of alignment with the other two (second picture) having been displaced downwards, this card is also buff, a colour not reported by Spalding, while Higgins and Gage list cream to yellow buff, so it may be that the buff card used turns yellowish on exposure to light. This seems to have been the case with the card shown above.

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1st November 1934  1½f postcard, note that as with the 3rd regular issue stamps the imprinted stamp now has six characters in the heading at the top.

1st November 1934  1½f + 1½f Reply Paid Postcard

1935 - 1937 China Mail Postcards

A new 2f postcard was produced as a result of the Sino-Manchukuo postal agreement of December 1934. This was based upon the First China Mail stamp design and as a result cards sent to China would not be subjected to additional postage due charges, as had previously been the case. Importantly, the new cards did not include "Manchu Empire" in the heading, the remaining five characters simply read "Postal Service, Post Card".

On 1st April 1937 remaining stocks of the 2f stamp were overprinted with a surcharge changing the value to 2½f and a new 2½f postcard produced as a result of a price increase.

1st January 1935  2f Postcard, this could be used domestically within Manchukuo, for post to Japan and also for mail to China. The imprinted stamp is based upon the design of the new China Mail 2f postage stamp the only difference being colour, the 2f China mail stamp is sage green.

This card appears in two varieties, with the five horizontal characters within 7mm to 9mm of the imprinted stamp, or within 10mm to 12mm of the imprinted stamp. The above example is of the narrower setting.

1st April 1937   1935 2f China Mail Postcard with a surcharge showing the new rate of  2½f.

1st April 1937  2½f  China Mail Postcard, the colour now matched that of the 2½f  China Mail postage stamp. Cards produced in 1937 were printed on cream stock in 1938 this was changed to buff. Toning and dirt gathered over the last 70 years makes the true colour of the card hard to distinguish.

Fourth Regular Issue Postcards 1936 to 1944.

On the 4th December 1936 Manchukuo launched the Fourth Regular Issue of postage stamps, all with a scenic theme. This prompted the postal administration to re-design existing postcards based upon the new set of definitive stamps.

The first cards to appear, either late December 1936 or early January 1937, were the 6f and the 6f x 6f for use on foreign mail, this was based upon the "Farmers Carting Soya Beans" design. Another price increase took place on 1st April 1937 and this meant that these cards were only in use for four months. It appears that unused stock was recalled and destroyed, making these cards quite difficult to find.

The complete "fourth Regular Issue" set of postcards was released on 1st April 1937 but the "Farmers Carting Soya Beans" design may have been considered unsatisfactory. The very heavy use of parallel lines made the design look clumsy compared to the stamps with dies engraved by Kikuji Nakata. After the initial stocks of this card had been sent out they were redrawn, presumably by a different engraver. The new design has a lighter sky, with well defined clouds and a single line frame around the imprinted stamp, the finished look is much closer to that of the "fourth Regular Issue"  postage stamps. Redrawn stamps went on sale during November 1937.

1st April 1937  1f Postcard (Type 1) for local post only, there are three types of this card and they seem to have been discontinued at the end of this year. In this example the top of the left hand character "政" lines up with the top edge of the "洲" character of the imprinted stamp.

1st April 1937  2f Postcard (Type 1). In this example the bottom three characters in the heading line up with the centre of the imprinted stamp. The sky is heavily lined and there is an error in the drawing of the "2" character, with two lines above the usual top line.

July 1937  Used 2f Postcard (Type 2) with (Zirkle 32), commemorative cancellation (26-28th July 1937). In this example the top of the left hand character "政" lines up with centre of the orchid crest of the imprinted stamp. The sky is heavily lined. "2" character error corrected.

November 1937  2f Postcard (redrawn) and on cream card. This example has light clouds in the sky and several other differences from the earlier 2f two cards shown.

April 1938  2f Postcard (redrawn) and on buff card. It seems that the postal administration changed the supplier of card around April 1938, the change in colour and quality is quite noticeable. The 10f postcards remained on the higher quality cream card.

1st April 1937  4f Imprinted Letter-sheet (also known as a sealed post card - face and reverse shown above), these were in use from April 1937 and continued in an up-rated form until the fall of Manchukuo in 1945. The above example can be dated by the commemorative cancellation to 17th or 18th May 1942 (Zirkle 62), by which time the additional 2f stamp was required. Letter-sheets measure 90mm x 140mm folded and 320mm x 140mm when opened.

There are two distinct varieties of letter-sheet, the above with the horizontal characters (reading - top 6 "Manchu Empire Postal Service", bottom 4, "Sealed Post Card") aligning slightly above the top of the imprinted stamp, (as in this example), or aligning slightly below. There are also stamp colour variations. In October 1944 the paper colour was changed from cream to white, these later examples are hard to find.

1st April 1937  10f Postcard for all overseas destinations, excluding Japan and China, early version with the "Sky of lines", later redrawn - see below.. It is curious that the 10f Imprinted stamp is a red version of "Farmers Carting Soya Beans" and not as in the 1936 fourth Regular Issue, the "Summer Palace at Chengteh" - why the change?

April/May 1938  10f Postcard on cream card, redrawn version with sky of clouds. A further "sky of clouds" design on white card was issued in May of 1943 and is very rare.

1st April 1937  10f + 10f Reply Paid Postcard, above are both parts of this card, the top copy is for use by the sender and below the reply section used by the recipient. The horizontal characters read "Manchu Empire Postal Service Reply Paid Card", the alternative French wording is in error, a grave accent appears in place of the acute accent "è", this was corrected in later issues. This card is something of a rarity and sought after by collectors.

April 1938 This is a redrawn version of the above card with the "Sky of Clouds" design on cream card. Note the corrected accent "é" above the E.  

A further issue on white card might have been in May 1943, but is also possible that this card was not issued and the small number known come from stock looted by the Russian military from the vaults of Hsinking Post Office at the end of the war.

26th July 1941 - Imprinted Picture Postcards

On 26th July 1941 a new series of the 2f and 10f imprinted postcards in 15 designs became available for purchase at the five largest post offices, Hsinking, Mukden, Harbin, Chinchou and Mutankiang. The cards were sold as a set, in a green folder with a description of each card in blue, printed in Chinese and Japanese. The 15f cards were the only cards issued in Manchukuo with the heading "Post Card" written in English. The 2f cards, for domestic use, had five Chinese characters reading "Postal Service Post Card" as a heading.

The original plan was to issue new sets of picture cards every six months, but as the first issue failed to sell in sufficient numbers this idea was dropped. The probably reason for the lack of sales was probably the competition being offered by private printers who were offering more commercial and attractive designs, the government issue being pretty dull by comparison.

2f Card from 1st March 1942

3f Up-rated Card from 28th January 1944.

Above is an example of the 2f (domestic) picture postcard, face and reverse. This card shows three Mongolian girls and a yurt. A full list of titles includes;

The Showa Steelworks at Anshan.

Three Mongolian Girls (See above)

Above is an example of the 10f (foreign mail) postcard. This was printed on better quality card and had captions in both English and Chinese, in this instance the English caption reads "Lama "Festival", and in Chinese "Dancing Devil", other pictures included;

On 1st March 1942, the domestic mail cost increased to 3f and it was decided to imprint a 1f stamp on all cards that remained unsold. The new cards with the additional 1f imprinted stamp did not go on sale until 28th January 1944 (see above). The re-valued cards were available from the post offices listed above and also from any of the places shown in the pictures, for instance Anshan, or Liaoyang, etc., the cards were sold singly at 5f each, the postage 3f plus a 2f charge for the card itself.

A forerunner of these designs may be some promotional postcards produced by the Wakaso Medical Co., in support of the Manchukuo Development Labour Service Organization. Click here for more details.

Feint offset of the imprinted 1f stamp on the face of the "tractor clearing land for cultivation" card.

2nd May 1941 - First Series of Imprinted Postcards with Slogans

On 2nd May 1941 a new version of the 2f imprinted postcard was issued and for the first time in Manchukuo these cards had slogans written in Chinese or Japanese across the bottom. There are a total of 28 different versions of this card, 16 with slogans in Chinese and 12 with slogans in Japanese.

In 1940 it is estimated that over 40 million postcards were sold in Manchukuo, and it must have occurred to someone that this provided an ideal opportunity for propaganda. In July 1940 various ministries were asked to submit short slogans to be printed at the bottom of the 2f postcard. In all over 150 suggestions were received and after a selection process 28 were chosen to be included on a 2f Postcard. To see translations of the slogans, view this page in the Microsoft Explorer browser and hover your mouse over each slogan shown below.

The reason 28 slogans were chosen was due to the size of the printing plates to be used. The plates had room for 56 cards, this meant 2 of each could be printed at a time. In fact, and for reasons that are unclear, the plates used in the printing had 56 versions of the same card, this drastically slowed down the production process. By the release date of 2nd May 1941 only 4 postcard designs had reached Post Offices and ready were for distribution, the balance followed later in the same year. It is likely that around 800,000 copies of each card was produced.

 This is a typical message from one of the slogans

Card colours

These cards were printed on two very distinctive types of card a reddish buff colour and a yellowish cream. Seen together the contrast is quite striking and has nothing to do with fading or toning.

Buff

Cream

 16 Chinese Slogans

12 Japanese Slogans

(My thanks to Mun Kit Ng of Singapore and Travis Searls of Denver for  help with the above translations)

Price Changes 1st March 1942

On the 1st of March 1942 the cost of sending a domestic postcard increased from 2f to 3f, however at this time no replacement cards were available with the new rate, consequently it was necessary for the post offices to up-rate old cards using existing postage stamps. A variety of combinations of cards and stamps were used for this purpose and this process was also applied to the 3f reply paid cards.

The standard method of up-rating a card used by the Post Office was to apply the extra stamp or stamps below the imprinted stamp, leaving the legend at the top of each card fully readable. Where this practice is not followed it is likely that the card has been up-rated by the user.

Up-rated 1941, 2f Imprinted postcard. This card was probably up-rated by an individual. Post Offices usually placed the additional stamp below the imprinted stamp.

15th September 1943 - Second Series of Imprinted Postcards with Slogans

On 15th September 1943 a set of new 3f imprinted postcards appeared, with four new slogans written by three famous calligraphers. The new cards were designed by Yoai Ota and Takoo Yamashita. Unlike all previous issues they were not based on existing postage stamps and were printed typographically. The new design featured the flowers found on an important historic Manchurian fabric with the addition of a slogan reading "One Virtue, One Spirit" set in an oval frame.

 An additional four cards with new slogans came into use throughout 1943 and early 1944. on 1st April 1944 plain cards were issued without slogans.

Chinese Slogans

Japanese Slogans

Price Changes 1st October 1944

The last price change took place on 1st October 1944 when the cost of sending a postcard increased to 5 fen, as with the previous increase no new cards were available, so in this instance the Post Office overprinted stocks of the 3 fen card.

1st October 1944 - February 1944 3f Chinese slogan card up-rated with the addition of a 2f stamp and an April 1942 3f plain postcard surcharged with a value of 5f for domestic use (also Japan and China).

17th December 1944. A 5 fen postcard, of a similar design to the 3 fen, was introduced most of these postcards had the imprinted stamp in a light blue grey, however a variety is known with a dark blue imprinted stamp, as shown above.  The example on the right has a local Mukden Type overprint (Chin-chow county) showing that it was in use after the war. A 5f x 5f reply paid version of this card was designed but never issued.

                                                                      First Day of Issue

Post war Chin Hsien, Mukden Type overprint

1st July 1945. The war was taking its toll on postal workers and printers, as a result of this a new 5f card was introduced on 1st July 1945. This featured a very feint design, this time printed in pale green on greyish-white paper with a reduced size of 77mm x 122.5mm. The second example has a first day of issue postmark from Hsinking Central P.O.

The labour shortage was so great that it was decided not to cancel mail and deliver only to the local head of each Neighbourhood Association, who would then arrange for delivery on behalf of the Post Office.

To prevent re-use the address side of the new 5f card had four printed panels, the design was intended to make it obvious if anyone tried to remove and original address, rewrite it and use the card again. Reading from left to right the instruction above each panel reads,

Left Panel - Senders name and address, (below) Senders Neighbourhood Association name and number.
Centre Panel - Name of recipient.
Right Panel - Address of recipient.
Lower Panel - Recipients Neighbourhood Association number.

 This card was only in circulation for a little over eight weeks before the war ended. However, use did not end there, as these cards (along with the 5f above) do sometimes appear with soft black, four character, Mukden type (Chung Hwa Temporary Use) overprints. This shows that some postcards continued in use during at least part of the 1945 to 1947 transitional period.

Official Postcards

This is rare example of an official post office postcard, the boxed 郵政公事 reads Post Office Official and below  奉天中央郵政局 Mukden Central Post Office. The buff coloured card is the standard 90mm x 140mm size and it is likely that these were produced locally for Post Office use. The date is uncertain and can be any time from October 1935 to July 1945.

Post War Examples

Occasionally card appear that have been used after July 1945, mostly these are deliberate philatelic items and sometimes they are just used because they were the nearest cards to hand. In all instances the imprinted stamps were considered worthless and had to be replaced with current issues.

The above card was sent from Japan on 15th May 1946 and is of philatelic interest. S.C.A.P. stands for Supreme Commander of the Allied Powers a post held by General Douglas MacArthur. Colonel Bidwell was clearly attached to the post war offices of the occupation in Japan.

The Manchukuo Official Military Postcard

Shown above is the only official Military Postcard issued to the Manchukuo army. This card is something of a rarity indicating that issue date is likely to be some time late in 1944. The design is printed on off white, medium weight card, the front of which is smooth the reverse slightly textured and blank. The size is 86mm x 130mm, smaller than a standard postcard.

The heading reads "Manchoukuo Military Post Card", on the helmet the seal script reads "Exclusive use of military personnel", the characters at the foot of the card read "Kangteh 11, Hsinking" (1944). Thanks go to Richard Arent for providing the translation.

I have not seen a used example so the way in which it was used and the correct method of address is currently a mystery. If anyone reading this has a used copy please send me a scan.

To see examples of Japanese Military Postcards used in Manchukuo click here

Sources of  the information used in this page - The first person to write definitively (in English) about the Imprinted Postcards of Manchukuo was Dr. Robert M. Spaulding Jr., his "The Catalogue of Postal Stationary of the Japanese Occupation of China, Part One, Manchuria", forms the core of Western knowledge of this subject and was the basis of the Higgins & Gage section on Manchukuo. I have found both works very helpful in compiling this page. Other references include the JSCA Japanese Stamp Specialized Catalogue Vol. 3 and articles from "The China Clipper", the journal of the China Stamp Society.