Lot 20320 – 1941 An extraordinarily undelivered mail almost four years later

1941 (Aug 3) Stampless cover from Crete, sent from a mother to her son, addressed to the Italian Consulate in Salonica for onward transmission, with full contents which were censored where the dateline with the name of the locality of origin was cancelled, but indicating in line 13 in the text “here in Crete…”, with “P.M.550E/Comando Superiore FF.AA.Egeo/Essente da Tassa Autorizzazione Postgen/N.563613-164634.V.3 del 26.4.4.1XIX” free-postage marking, which was mysteriously applied on a mail from a mother (was she a member of a military unit?), two P.M. 550 cds’s, one also intriguingly struck one day after (as it was not necessary), but justifying why this letter was never delivered to the addressee, and then, being even more surprising, showing the “Return to Sender/Service Suspended” cachet which may have been applied years later when the British arrived to Greece in 1945 and could not forward this mail as the addressee was no longer available. (Valter Astolfi acquired this envelope deducing that it was never opened, as it was not delivered, and extracted the contents by removing one lap of the censor’s label). An extraordinary, mysterious and fascinating postal history usage also illustrating the liberation of Crete.