Collection area

Already before the Normandy landings, the Allies were aware that they would find many people from all over the world in Germany and the areas it occupied. (11 million people were expected). The Supreme Headquarters, Allied Expeditionary Forces (SHAEF) decided to gather them in camps and to repatriate them to their home countries as soon as possible. SHAEF also involved other organisations in the implementation of these measures, in particular the United Nations Relief and Rehabilitation Administration (UNRRA), a division of the United Nations founded on November 9, 1943, whose first teams arrived in occupied Germany in April 1945. In May 1946, 279 teams looked after a total of 765,000 people in collective camps (see chart). On June 30, 1947 UNRRA closed down its activities in Germany; from then on, the International Refugee Organization (IRO) took care of the homeless foreigners.

In Germany, the Balts were quartered in collective camps for "Displaced Persons" (DP camps). DPs were, in the strict sense, people who had been forced labourers in Germany or had been forcibly taken into the Reich territory by the Germans. In a broader sense, however, they also included people who had voluntarily worked for the Germans in Reich territory, had served in the German Wehrmacht or had fled the Russians from the Baltic states.

In total there were hundreds of DP camps, see for example this list or the adjacent graphic.

After years of living in the DP camps, the refugees realised that they would not be returning to their ancestral homeland, at least not in the foreseeable future. Since Germany had been completely devastated by the war, the German population had hardly any housing or work and the German economy was destroyed, it was not possible for the DPs to remain in Germany.

From September 1946 emigration to another European country or overseas was advertised; this was intensified in 1947. After a health examination (single, able-bodied male DPs had the best chances) and a check of the political past, emigration could take place, mostly via the emigration camp in Ludwigsburg.

Estonians emigrated mainly to Sweden, the United States of America, Canada and Australia. Smaller groups remained in Germany or Denmark, etc.

The letters were sent via the British Field Post Office (FPO) until 4.5.1947. Camouflage addresses without location information were to be used for this purpose; these camouflage addresses contained the numbers of the Assembly Centres (AC) and the Displaced Persons Assembly Centre Staff (DPACS, DPAC Administration), from July 1947 also called DPACCS (Displaced Persons Assembly Centre Commanding Staff).

From 5.5.1947, letters from DPs were no longer transported abroad by the British field post. Therefore, from this date onwards, camouflage addresses (such as the AC number, the censorship office "800 Control Unit" or also the routing mark "BAOR via Gt. Britain", BAOR = British Army of the Rhine in Germany) were no longer used, but the open camp address with the Assembly Centre number, town, street and house number.

From now until 19.4.1949 the Deutsche Post had to bear the charges, then the postage-free carriage within Germany ended. Single items sent abroad were postage-free until 31.8.1949.

The DPs had to use envelopes for further postage-free transport, on some of which the postmarks of their camps were stamped, in any case also either a postmark at the top right with "Displaced Persons Mail Paid", which were designed in various shapes (mostly rectangular) or sometimes also with adhesive labels (in Meerbeck) or typewritten on adhesive labels (in Dortmund). In Meerbeck and Leese, the place name also appears in the postmark.

From February 1949, the British military government introduced the two-line postmark "Displaced Persons Mail Paid". and this was also published by the Head Office of the Post Office in Frankfurt on 4.3.1949 (for ordinary items).

However, the majority of domestic letters from DPs were franked with stamps for lack of knowledge on the part of the camp commanders about the exemption from postage for domestic mail in the British zone, i.e. the exemption from postage was actually used very little. That is why there is hardly any circulated domestic consumer mail.

Augsburg, August 1946, Lithuanian camp post stamps

Hanau, 1.11.1947, advertising issue with surcharge on the occasion of the Estonian-Lithuanian Stamp Exhibition November 1-3, 1947 (souvenir sheet and single stamps).

The Estonian camp post in Geislingen/Steige

Representative of the Estonian camp mail in Germany, the following is taken from the book "Stille, Bernhard 1994: Vom Baltikum ins Schwabenland. Estenlager und Ausquartiertenschicksal in Geislingen 1945–1950. Veröffentlichungen des Stadtarchivs Geislingen/Steige Band II. Weissenhorn: Konrad-Verlag." (Text and illustrations with kind permission of the publisher):

Since on the one hand the three districts of Schloßhalde, Wilhelmshöhe and Rappenäcker were far apart, on the other hand, Geislingen's postmen were forbidden to enter the Esten camp, UNRRA camp administration set up its own camp post office, which cooperated with the German post office of the town of Geislingen. All the so-called Estonian mail was brought by mail cart from the German post office to the Estonian post office, where it was collected personally by the camp residents, later delivered to the recipients by postmen. The Estonians always had to collect parcels personally throughout the camp.

Initially, when postal traffic with foreign countries was not yet permitted, a few postal workers employed by UNRRA were sufficient to handle incoming and outgoing mail. However, when in the years 1946/47, international postal traffic was liberalised and the parcels sent from foreign Estonians in the USA and Sweden arrived in larger quantities, the Estonian camp administration had to recruit more postal workers. However, these were no longer paid by UNRRA. Therefore, the Estonian Post Office had to had to find new sources of income. Thus it came about that the Estonian camp administration, with the approval of UNRRA, decided to issue its own camp stamps.

The stamps were designed by the Estonian Aleksander Daniel and appeared on November 4, 1947. They showed a horse being chased by two wolves, a symbolic representation of the Estonians persecuted by the Russians. The designation of the stamps: ESTONIAN National Assembly Center Geislingen/Stg., next to it the Estonian national coat of arms, the three leopards in the breast shield.

The stamps were printed without value in the colours green, pink and red. The green ones were sold for 10 pfennigs and were used for franking postcards, letters and printed matter for the post office within the camp. The pink stamps were sold at 25 pfennigs and were used to collect penalty postage. This was the daily fee for parcels that had been left lying around. Since there was no room to store the parcels arriving in large quantities, and no vehicle to deliver them, the recipients had to collect the parcels as quickly as possible. This was also the purpose of the red stamps, which were sold to cover a four-day storage fee and cost 1 mark. Their number of copies was very small.

To cancel the stamps, the Geislingen post office had borrowed a round stamp with a three-line date that could be adjusted, without indicating the place.

The complete set of three values is very rare because of the small edition. Even rarer are real postal stationeries, which could only be franked with the green stamps. Most envelopes, however, were carelessly thrown away by the vast majority of camp residents at the time, as they were worthless to many.

Moreover, the Estonian post stamps were only valid within the camp; * for mail to other German places or abroad, one had to affix the stamps of the American occupation zone / Deutsche Post. It was only completely rare for an Estonian stamp to be stamped next to a German stamp by the Geislingen postal clerk because the sender mistakenly thought that he had to use both the Estonian and the German stamps.

When the Estonian DP camp was dissolved on June 24, 1950, the Estonian Post Office also terminated. The remaining stocks of green stamps were distributed among the postal officials of the time and other interested parties; the pink and red stamps were completely used up. The postmark was returned to the German post office. Thus ended a peculiar chapter of the Geislingen postal system.

* * *

* Harald Vogt reports in his article "Estonia – 1944 – 1991" in "Eesti Post No. 33/2001" , that the camp postage stamps (at least in other camps) were also used as surcharge postage for incoming express letters and telegrams and as surcharge postage for outgoing money transfers.

Cover for the 75th anniversary of the Estonian national flag 'Eesti Lipp', which first flew in Otepää on June 4, 1884 in the colours blue (like the sky) - black (like the peasants' boots) - white (like the snow).

The sender and producer of the vignette is the Estonian Philatelic Society in New York.

Receipt for the 100th anniversary of one of the first Estonian Singing festivals in 1863 in the villageAnseküla on the Sõr­ve peninsula (Saaremaa Island).

The Estonian Philatelic Society in New York is also the producer of the overprint.

Receipt for the 10th anniversary of the Stockholm-based Estonian Philatelic Society in Sweden "EFÜR", which celebrated this anniversary with a stamp exhibition week ( November 22 – 29, 1964).

Fair cover of the "Baltpex 6". Baltpex was a stamp exhibition covering the entire subject of philately of Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania and was held at changing locations, but often in Toronto.