The British post offices in Morocco, also known as the "Morocco Agencies", were a system of post office

Post office

A post office is a facility forming part of a postal system for the posting, receipt, sorting, handling, transmission or delivery of mail.Post offices offer mail-related services such as post office boxes, postage and packaging supplies...

s operated by the United Kingdom

United Kingdom

The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern IrelandIn the United Kingdom and Dependencies, other languages have been officially recognised as legitimate autochthonous languages under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages...

 in Morocco

Morocco

Morocco , officially the Kingdom of Morocco , is a country located in North Africa. It has a population of more than 32 million and an area of 710,850 km², and also primarily administers the disputed region of the Western Sahara...

.

First office

The first office was established in Tangier

Tangier

Tangier, also Tangiers is a city in northern Morocco with a population of about 700,000 . It lies on the North African coast at the western entrance to the Strait of Gibraltar where the Mediterranean meets the Atlantic Ocean off Cape Spartel...

 in 1857; mail was simply bagged there and forwarded to Gibraltar

Gibraltar

Gibraltar is a British overseas territory located on the southern end of the Iberian Peninsula at the entrance of the Mediterranean. A peninsula with an area of , it has a northern border with Andalusia, Spain. The Rock of Gibraltar is the major landmark of the region...

 just across the water, where it received the standard "A26" postmark. From 1872 Tangier had its own postmark

Postmark

thumb|USS TexasA postmark is a postal marking made on a letter, package, postcard or the like indicating the date and time that the item was delivered into the care of the postal service...

, but this was applied alongside the stamps (allowing for the Gibraltar cancellation to mark them), so usages of British stamps from Morocco are best determined on cover

Cover (philately)

In philately, the term cover pertains to the outside of an envelope or package with an address, typically with postage stamps that have been cancelled and is a term generally used among stamp and postal history collectors. The term does not include the contents of the letter or package, although...

.
Several examples of loose GB Queen victoria stamps cancelled Tangier do exist including at least one strip of 1d reds.

Since the offices were under the control of Gibraltar, they switched to the use of Gibraltar stamps when they came into use, 1 January 1886. Additional offices opened in various Moroccan seaports during the 1880s, and inland at Fez

Fes, Morocco

Fes or Fez is the second largest city of Morocco, after Casablanca, with a population of approximately 1 million . It is the capital of the Fès-Boulemane region....

 (1892), and Meknes

Meknes

Meknes is a city in northern Morocco, located from the capital Rabat and from Fes. It is served by the A2 expressway between those two cities and by the corresponding railway. Meknes was the capital of Morocco under the reign of Moulay Ismail , before it was relocated to Marrakech. The...

 (1907).

The stamps were overprint

Overprint

An overprint is an additional layer of text or graphics added to the face of a postage stamp or banknote after it has been printed. Post offices most often use overprints for internal administrative purposes such as accounting but they are also employed in public mail...

ed "Morocco / Agencies" beginning in 1898, initially at the offices of the Gibraltar Chronicle

Gibraltar Chronicle

The Gibraltar Chronicle is a national newspaper published in Gibraltar since 1801. It became a daily in 1821. It is Gibraltar's oldest established daily newspaper and the world's second oldest English language newspaper to have been in print continuously...

, and then later in London

London

London is the capital city of :England and the :United Kingdom, the largest metropolitan area in the United Kingdom, and the largest urban zone in the European Union by most measures. Located on the River Thames, London has been a major settlement for two millennia, its history going back to its...

, yielding several variations in the appearance of the overprint.

Direct control

On 1 January 1907, the British Post Office took direct control of the post offices, operating them until Moroccan independence in 1956. From this point on, all stamps were overprints on British issues, in no less than three different currencies.

British-currency stamps were available at any office, and primarily intended for parcels and later airmail

Airmail

Airmail is mail that is transported by aircraft. It typically arrives more quickly than surface mail, and usually costs more to send...

. Both regular and some commemorative issues were overprinted, all with "MOROCCO / AGENCIES", through the Edward VIII issue of 1936. Subsequently unoverprinted stamps were used, until 1949, when they were again overprinted for use at Tetuan (at that point the sole remaining office, except for Tangier, which had its own overprints).

Spanish currency stamps

Spanish-currency stamps were also available at all offices until the establishment of the French Zone

French Morocco

French Protectorate of Morocco was a French protectorate in Morocco, established by the Treaty of Fez. French Morocco did not include the north of the country, which was a Spanish protectorate...

, after which they were limited to the Spanish Zone

Spanish Morocco

The Spanish protectorate of Morocco was the area of Morocco under colonial rule by the Spanish Empire, established by the Treaty of Fez in 1912 and ending in 1956, when both France and Spain recognized Moroccan independence.-Territorial borders:...

. The overprint was basically the same as for the British-currency stamps, with the added complication of needing to fit in the denomination in Centimo

Céntimo

The céntimo was a currency unit of Spain and other countries which were historically influenced by Spain or Portugal . The word derived from the Latin Centum meaning "hundred"...

s and Pesetas

Spanish peseta

The peseta was the currency of Spain between 1869 and 2002. Along with the French franc, it was also a de facto currency used in Andorra .- Etymology :...

. All types of British stamps were overprinted, the last being the issues of Elizabeth II in the summer of 1956; all were withdrawn from sale 31 December of that year.

French currency

French-currency stamps, intended for use in the French Zone, date from 1917, and continued in use until 8 January 1938, when they were withdrawn from sale. The overprints are just as for the Spanish currency, but fewer types were produced.

The Tangier International Zone

Tangier Protocol

Tangier Protocol was an agreement signed between France, Spain and the United Kingdom by which Tangier, Morocco became an international zone.-History:The protocol was signed in 1925. Starting from 1929, Spain assumed the policing of the city...

 received its own overprints beginning in 1927. As British currency was in use in that office, the overprint simply reads "TANGIER". This continued through 1956. On 1 April 1957, a commemorative overprint added "1857-1957" to celebrate the 100th anniversary of the post office, but this had a very short shelf life; the office at Tangier was closed and the stamps withdrawn from sale on 30 April 1957.

Philatelic literature

The most substantial book on the Morocco Agencies, by Dr David A. Stotter, Chairman of the GB Overprints Society (GBOS), was published in October 2007 by the Postal History Society (PHS) and the British Philatelic Trust (BPT), 367 pp, hardbound, price £49. Entitled "The British Post Office Service in Morocco 1907-57" it covers in great depth the postal history of the so-called British Period, from the transfer of control to the GPO from Gibraltar in January 1907 to the closure of the Tangier post office in April 1957. This book has recently been awarded the RPSL Crawford Medal and a Large Gold at Harrogate 2008.

The first booklet on the Morocco Agencies, written by John H Vallis was published by H F Johnson in 1921. The second was written by R H Sampson, and was published by the Royal Philatelic Society London in 1959 in a limited edition of 250 copies. Subsequent to that the late Dr Ken Clough produced 2 booklets (the second being a revised version of the first) published by the Gibraltar Study Circle in 1978 and 1984. The G B Overprints Society (GBOS) also published in 1992 a booklet specifically on the Overprinted GB issues of Edward VII written by M H Gellatly & M K Wlodarczyk.

The Gibraltar Period up to the end of 1906 has been covered in great detail in a book written by Richard Garcia now published by the PHS/BPT. The title is: "The British Postal Service in Morocco 1749-1906", details from John Sussex as above. Richard's book, together with that by David Stotter, provides complete coverage of the postal history of the British Post Office in Morocco. A third book is planned covering the stamps and postal stationery.

See also

• List of postal codes in Morocco
• Postage stamps and postal history of Morocco
  Postage stamps and postal history of Morocco
  The first Moroccan postal stamps were produced in 1891 by companies which managed correspondence between two cities. The system was replaced after a reorganization in the end of 1911...