The Dauer collection, containing rarities and pieces of exceptionally choice quality,will be featured in Siegel's Fall 2020 auction of United States stamps

THE FIRST YEAR OF THE AMERICAN CIVIL WAR WASmarked by a surprising show of force by the Confederatemilitary and severe disruptions of trade, which had an unsettling effect on the financial markets. The U.S. Treasurysuspended all specie payments in December 1861, creatingeven greater anxiety and causing speculators and the public tohoard silver coins. The devaluation of paper currency againstgold and silver added fuel to the fire, and by mid-1862 a vastquantity of silver and even copper-nickel coinage was removedfrom circulation. The 1862 coin shortage led to private stopgap measures in the form of copper tokens and scrip.

Postage stamps, which had a fixed value in denominations ofless than one dollar, were also used as an exchange medium,but they had obvious physical shortcomings. Continuoushandling of a small piece of gummed paper quickly rendereda stamp useless, and the Post Office refused to exchange newstamps for damaged ones.

To remedy the coin shortage, Secretary of the TreasurySalmon P. Chase proposed the idea of postage stampcurrency. President Lincoln signed the congressional PostageCurrency Act on July 17, 1862. The act was drafted andpassed without consulting postal officials, and its wordingseemed to authorize the use of postage stamps as currency,rather than authorizing a special issue of postage currency.In response to the published reports of the new PostageCurrency Act in July 1862, the public demand for postagestamps exploded.

John Gault, a small-time inventor and purveyor of munitions, was in New York City in July 1862 and prepared tolaunch his patented "New Metallic Currency." Gault's conceptwas simple: insert a postage stamp into a sealed metal casewith a mica window, through which the stamp could be seen.Gault's encased postage stamps were produced at the ScovillManufacturing Company, a button and token maker inWaterbury, Connecticut.

Gault's encasements were promoted as something more thana practical coin substitute. Businesses could have advertisements die-stamped into the metal backing, which made theman effective marketing tool. Hotels, patent medicine manufacturers, dry goods merchants, hatters, a jeweler, liquor andwine merchants, and an insurance company were amongGault's 31 customers.

One of the earliest collectors was a well-known philatelistnamed Charles Gregory. Among the other prominent pioneercollectors of encased postage are Hiram E. Deats, C. S. Wilcoxand William S. Appleton. Just prior to and after World War IIthe field was dominated by Colonel Green, T. James Clarke,F. C. C. Boyd, Josiah K. Lilly Jr., J. T. Temple and ArnoldPerl. The successor to these collectors was John J. Ford Jr.,whose outstanding collection was sold by Stack's in 2004. Inthe wake of the Ford sale, collectors such as Frederick R.Mayer, Dana Linett, "Summit" (Siegel Sale 955), DonaldKagin, Dr. William A. Litle, and, of course, Drs. Joanne andEdward Dauer, emerged to the foreground.

Drs. Joanne and Edward Dauer have spent a lifetime as collectors. Theirinterest includes stamps, paper money, historical documents, and many otherareas. They started collecting encased postage in 2007 and strived to obtain the finest and rarest specimens with attention to quality. They thank their close friend, Sonny Hagendorf, for his guidance and assistance in the acquisition of many great items over the years. As a collector once told them, "We are only custodians of these historical items during our lifetime; it is time to pass them on to another generation of collectors".

The Fall 2020 U.S.stamp auction catalogue,featuring the Dauer Encased Postage collection,will be available in September

To read the complete article, see:
The Drs. Joanne and Edward Dauer Collection Civil War Encased Postage(https://siegelauctions.com/desp/DrsDauer.pdf)