Counterfeit Finnish Occupation of Russia Stamp
Authentic "Aunus" overprint beside apparent counterfeit stamp
Aunus is the Finnish name for the town of Olonets which was briefly occupied by Finland in 1919. Finnish stamps overprinted with the town's name were issued on June 27, 1919 but the town fell under the control of the Russian Bolsheviks shortly afterwards.
When I was quickly scanning through a box lot I noticed this stamp and initially wondered if it was an example of a straight line cancellation (See http://www.groseducationalmedia.ca/vsc/finlandrussia1.html for a further discussion of these cancellations). When I discovered that this was actually (theoretically) an overprint, I was quite excited but a note in the catalogue to the effect that "Counterfeits exist" prompted me to take a closer look. I realized that the closer look should hardly have been necessary, the crude hand-written overprint represented a rather weak effort to convert a common Finnish stamp worth 25 cents to a more interesting overprinted Finnish Occupation of Russia issue worth $12.50 (Scott 2009).
Bibliography
Kloetzel, James E. ed.
"Finland." Standard Postage Stamp Catalogue. Sidney, Ohio: Scott Publishing, 2008.
Kloetzel, James E. ed.
"Russia." Standard Postage Stamp Catalogue. Sidney, Ohio: Scott Publishing, 2008.
Rossiter, Stuart and John Flower. The Stamp Atlas. London: Macdonald and Co., 1986.
