NC-EO-3

In 1858, a series of blue/blue “Telegram Immediate” envelopes was issued with “New South Wales/Electric Telegraph” embossed in a seal on the flap. The main 28 Telegraph Offices had their names - from Adelong to Wentworth and including Sydney - embossed in the inner oval of the seal. Another envelope had no office name embossed on the flap to permit use at other offices.

The flaps in the archival set were also endorsed with the number of envelopes required – these totals ranging from 150,000 (Sydney) to 5,000.

The delivery envelopes shown below form the only recorded set.
Provenance: De La Rue archives, Gundersen and Johnstone.

Prestige Philately, September 2006 Lot 487.

NC-EO-3.

Front side of an unused De La Rue delivery envelope from the archival set.

NC-EO-3 - reverse side.

Shows the embossed seal for SYDNEY and the major curve in the flap design.

Enlargement of the embossed SYDNEY seal.

The De La Rue & Co., London note under the left side of the flap.

The archival set had the following 27 names embossed in the seals in addition to SYDNEY (shown above) plus the blank seal.

Details of the individual Telegraph Offices can be accessed from the list of NSW Telegraph Offices.

Details of use and rarity.

Form sub-number	Schedule number	Earliest recorded date	Rarity rating
EO-3	None		RRRR (even unused)

Heading and notes:	No form number. TELEGRAM, IMMEDIATE printed in the top rectangular frame.
Message area:	Blank.
Reverse side:	Has embossed seal on flap.
Colours (text & envelope):	Blue on blue.
Size of envelope overall:	82 × 138 mm.