WARTIME PROVISIONALS

In May 1941 the premisis of Sloper's were destroyed during a blitz on London, destroying a large number of their stamp perforating dies.

With World War II in full swing, resources (both of material and manpower), Sloper's buisiness was kept going by using single letter dies, with sheets of stamps being perforated multiple times, once for each letter required. This resulted in very un-even letter spacings that would also vary widely which is the characteristic of the provisional issues.

Some combinations of letters, such as "&Co" were common and hence dies were made specifically for these. In addition, some dies survived the bombing, such as "PAC" from which one letter (in this case the 'P') was removed, enabling the die to be used for a number of companies.

These provisional dies predominately appear on the King George VI "light colour" definitives that were in use at the time, although occasionally they turn up on the earlier "dark colour" definitives.