1842-45 3c United States Despatch Post, Black Blue Green Glazed Paper, Surface Colored

Scott #6LB5 is a 3-cent carrier stamp issued by the United States City Despatch Post in New York City from 1842 to 1845, printed in black on blue-green glazed, surface-colored paper. The design features an engraved bust portrait of George Washington within an oval frame, with "United States City Despatch Post" surrounding the portrait and "Three Cents" at the bottom — a design derived directly from the earlier Greig's City Despatch Post stamps that preceded government takeover. The stamp was printed in sheets of 42 subjects and issued imperforate, as was standard for the era. The distinctive glazed surface of the blue-green paper variety distinguishes it from the earlier unsurfaced light blue paper stamps (6LB3), and the surface-colored glazed paper varieties were produced in several shades including blue-green, green, and blue.

The history behind this stamp is one of the most remarkable in American philately. The City Despatch Post was founded in February 1842 by Henry Thomas Windsor and Alexander M. Greig as a private local letter delivery service in New York City, and it issued some of the earliest adhesive postage stamps in the United States — predating the first government-issued U.S. general issue stamps by five years. The service proved so successful that the U.S. Post Office Department purchased it in August 1842 and continued operating it as the United States City Despatch Post, keeping Greig on as agent. The government then issued its own carrier stamps — including the 6LB5 series — to prepay the combined 2-cent drop-letter rate plus 1-cent carrier fee. The service operated until 1845, when postal reform legislation altered the rate structure and ultimately made the operation uneconomical.

As a carrier stamp issued during the formative years of American postal history, #6LB5 occupies a uniquely important place in U.S. philately. The glazed paper varieties are scarcer than the earlier unsurfaced issues, and the stamps as a class trade infrequently — tied examples on cover command significant premiums and are considered important artifacts of early American postal history. Even as a single off-cover example, this stamp carries with it the distinction of belonging to the earliest chapter of adhesive stamp usage in the United States, making it a prized acquisition for collectors of classic U.S. issues, carrier stamps, and pre-federal postal history.