British comedian Frankie Boyle noted that if the Bible is a good record of their correspondence, the Corinthians never wrote back to St Paul.

"Dear Corinthians," he imagined Paul writing in his third letter, "I've written to you twice now. Still no reply. I don't know how you do things in Corinth, but where I come from, that's a bit rude."

But it seems not everyone is like the Corinthians. An 1870-1 cover on sale at Siegel suggests that some people are ambitious, or just dopey, enough to try to reply to Biblical texts. It is the second highlight we've picked out from the Andromeda collection.

The stamps are attractive in themselves: a 1c Ultramarine combined with a 12c Dull Violet. With rich colours and sharp early impressions, both stamps are tied by a single strike of the red "New York Paid All Direct June 24" circular datestamp with second strike on "Office Second Ave. R.R. Co." corner card cover.

To Ezekiel from Andromeda... the unusual cover

It is addressed to "Ezekiel. 33.15. Copenhagen. Denmark". Siegel's hypothesis to explain this is that a disgruntled resident of Copenhagen wrote to the office of the Second Avenue Rail Road Company in New York City, expressing anger over the railroad scandals of the day and ending his letter "Ezekiel 33.15".

This is a biblical reference to a passage which states "If the wicked wishes to live, the first thing he must do is to restore that which he has stolen." The railroad employee who answered the letter used "Ezekiel 33.15" as the address and mailed his reply to Copenhagen. The only thing missing from Siegel's explanation is the word 'dufus'.

The cover is somewhat modestly estimated at $1,500-2,000 in the auction which takes place in New York and online on April 21^st and would make an excellent investment and a collectible to treasure.

Tweet