CASTLE HIGH VALUES

The 1988 Castles

On the 18th October 1988 the Post Office released four new high value stamps featuring the same castles that had been used in a similar series some 30 years previously. This issue replaced the large format Machin designs that had been in use since XXX. Each castle came from one of the four different regions of Great Britain ; Carrickfergus (Northern Ireland), Caernarfon (Wales), Edinburgh (Scotland) and Windsor (England).

Each picture was based on photographs taken by HRH The Duke of York and the stamps were engraved and printed by Harrison and Sons Limited.

On the 24th March 1992 the set was re-released with enhanced security features. The original Queens head was changed to a silhouette printed in an optically variable ink whose colour changed as a function of the angle you looked at it. In addition, an eliptical perforation was added half way up the sides of the stamp. However, the main part of the design still used the original dies.

By 1995 iinflation had taken its toll and the £1 value was no longer considered to be a high value. Thus the £1 Carrickfergus Castle design was replaced by a £1 stamp following the standard low-value Machin design. However the Carrickfergus Castle was re-released as a £3 high value on the 22nd August 1995 .

In 1997, the contract for printing the stamps was moved from Harrison and Sons Limited to Enschedé. Since the master dies had been engraved by Harrisons and were therefor their property, Enschedé had to re-engrave each design. Although the general appearance of the stamp barely changed, the individual engraving marks were completely different, an example being illustrated above.

Harrison	Enschedé		Harrison	Enschedé

The best way to distinguish the two printers is by examining serifs of the leters 'C' and 'S' used in the word "CASTLE".Particularly note the differences of the lower point of the 'C' and the lower tail of the 'S'.

Harrison

Enschedé

An even quicker method can be used with £5 value in which the letter "W" in the Enschedé printing appears to be made up of two overlapping V's.

The series was finally relpaced on the 9th March 1999 by an intaglio-printed small format Machin design.