PRS CAPTAIN, CREW & OTHER SPECIAL COVERS

Introduction
There has been much discussion, not to mention confusion, over the years as to what constitutes a Captain's cover and a Crew cover for a Primary Recovery Ship (PRS). Different authors have used different definitions. Another limiting factor has been the lack of information on the exact circumstances of issue for some covers. Most definitions have also left out interesting and often important covers. I have therefore developed a set of definitions which cover all such covers. While these are based on those already in use, there are some differences. I have also found it necessary to develop definitions for more than one type of each cover.

See PRS Crew Size for information on the size of the crew for these ships.

Captain's Covers - Type 1
These are specially designed covers prepared at the direction of the ship's Captain. They are usually aboard the ship and are sometimes signed by the Captain. They were distributed free to various members of the crew and dignitaries. This is largely based on the Space Unit definition.

Captain's Covers - Type 2
These are covers with the Captain's corner card and/or have been signed by the Captain. They may or may not include a ship's cachet or other special cachet. This is largely based on the USCS definition.

Crew Covers - Type 1
These covers are specially designed covers usually prepared at the direction of an appropriate member of the crew (such as the Postal Officer) and distributed or sold to members of the crew. While often aboard the ship, some were privately ashore.

Crew Covers - Type 2
Most if not all PRSs and Destroyers had their own stationary which was available for purchase by members of the crew. Thus it was possible for a crew member to produce a 'crew cover' by having the ship's stationary stamped with the ship's or other cachet and postmarked. Also applies to covers designed by an individual crew member for their own use.

Crew Covers - Type 3
These are covers from a member of the crew using a 'standard' envelope (ie not ship's stationary). It may or may not have a RSC.

Crew Covers - Type B(eck) - A Special Case
A special case of crew covers are those produced by Morris Beck. Morris Beck, who had been designing Naval covers for some years, started designing Recovery Ship covers towards the end of the Mercury program. By the start of Gemini he was producing covers for most of the Recovery Force ships. He started by producing 300-400 covers per ship which increased to 500-600 per ship for Apollo, 800-1000 for Skylab and several thousand for ASTP. These covers were numbered with a Bxxx number between 1 and 999 (they were part of his overall series of Naval covers) with each ship in a mission being assigned covers with a different number (note that occassionally a ship would received covers from more than one group). As a thank you to the each ship's postal officer he produced 25+ covers without a number which he gave to the Postal Officer to distribute as he saw fit. As most of these have been lost over the years or tucked away in someone's attic they are quite rare and worth considerably more than the standard Beck covers. As these are identical to the standard Beck cover, except for the absence of a number, only one example (for GT-3) will be illustrated.

Special Covers - Type 1
This catagory includes covers produced for or by a dignitary who was aboard the ship. An example is Admiral's covers.

Special Covers - Type 2
This catagory covers all other covers which were especially created aboard a PRS for a recovery mission.

In the following table I will refer to Captain's Covers Type 1 as Captain's Covers for brevity.

Captain's Covers

Captain's Covers with Navy Cachets

Captain's Covers - Different Envelope Sizes^v

Crew Covers

Others

Cancelled on the day before recovery.

Unusual and Interesting Captain's and Crew Covers

Other Interesting Items

Varieties:
C- Cachet
N - None
P - Postmarks
E - Size or Type of Envelope
U/K - Unknown

Notes General:
i ) The status of these covers is uncertain. They were produced in reasonable quantity, are consistent and are signed by the Captain. However, it is unknow who ordered their creation and how they were distributed. As I have an identical cover , except it is signed by the Postal Clerk, it seems likely that they should be classified as Crew Covers Type 1. It could also be argued that it was a Captain's cover Type 2.
ii ) It's interesting to note that this particular Captain's cover has the wrong postage (4c instead of 5c)
iii ) These were produced by Dr Reuben A Ramkissoon. See correspondence with him.
iv) Correspondence with Sean Marsar
v) See Wikipedia for envelope sizes
vi) Note that the cachet was not added to a blank envelope but was added after the envelope was addressed.
vii) Wondergram was the Executive Officer of the USS Wasp for Gemini 6A and previously was the pilot of the helicopter that recovered Scott Carpenter during Mercury 7. He also directed aircraft carrier operations for Gemini 4, 6A and 7.

Notes Other:
1) From the collection of Steve Durst
1a) From Steve Durst's CD book - from the collection of David Ball
2) 'Primary Recovery Ship Cover Handbook', Ray E. Cartier,1993
3) From the collection of Dennis Dillman. Such covers also included a MA-8 or MA-9 card from the Captain².
3a) From the collection of Dennis Dillman.
5) Sold on eBay during 2010  a) 2011  b) 2012  c) 2013 d) 2015 e) 2016 f) 2020 g) 2021 h) 2022 i) 2024
6) 7) From the collection of David Ball
8) From the collection of Randy Constantin
9) From the collection of Anthony B O'Brien
10) From the collection of Joseph Volutza
11) From the collection of Timothy Preston
12) From the collection of Tom Steiner
13) From the collection of Lee Kok How
14) From the collection of Wolf Magnus

This page © Dr Ross J Smith
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Last modified on 11 October 2024
 

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