10-cent blue Jefferson Davis - Type I
(Scott CSA #11)

Left: Experimentally perforated Archer & Daly - Right: Partial imprint copy of Keatinge & Ball printing

John Archer designed and line engraved the stamp's central motif, a portrait of Jefferson Davis. The engraving was then transferred to steel printing plates. This is the same engraving as the “Frame Line” issue but without the frame lines. There were approximately 23,800,000 stamps printed from two plates, each with two panes of one hundred. There were numerous imprint varieties of “Archer & Daly, Bank Note Engravers, Richmond, Va.” The inscription was altered over the life of the plates. "Daly" was removed first, and later the entire imprint was removed. Full sheets of two hundred and panes of one hundred are known. The earliest recorded date of use is April 21, 1863. Colors vary from blue to milky blue, dark blue, and greenish blue. The most typical use was to pay the ten-cent letter rate. An unknown number of sheets were perforated in gauge 12 1/2. This perforation experiment proved impractical, but the perforated stamps were released for use.

In 1864, when Union forces threatened Richmond, the Confederate government moved the production of stamps and currency to a safer city, farther south. The four 10-cent plates, two each for Types I and II, were released to Keatinge & Ball of Columbia, South Carolina. Keatinge & Ball printed and supplied stamps until the end of the war. The Archer & Daly imprint was removed from the plates, and an imprint with the name of the new contractors was substituted. No other changes or retouching occurred.

The Keatinge & Ball printings can generally be recognized by the darker colors, generally inferior printing, and distinctive molasses-colored gum, which was laid on thickly and unevenly, creating streaks. The ink was applied with a heavy brush, which tended to blot-out background details such as the shading around the portrait. The shading frequently appears solid instead of cross-hatched, as on the Archer & Daly printings. Printing of the Keatinge & Ball stamps ceased on February 17, 1865, when Sherman's army captured Columbia, South Carolina.

The Archer & Daly printings of Types I and II together total approximately 47,600,000. The Keatinge & Ball printings of these issues together total approximately 15,000,000.

See the treatise in the Trouble Spots section of the Confederate Stamp Primer Online on How to tell Type I from Type II.

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