page_title: Postage stamps and postal history of Germany
section_title: German colonies
hierarchical_section_title: Postage stamps and postal history of Germany / Imperial Germany, 1871-1918 / German colonies
caption_attribution_description: English: Stamp of Karolinen
context_page_description: This is a survey of the postage stamps and postal history of Germany and philatelically related areas. The main modern providers of service were the Reichspost, the Deutsche Post under Allied control, the Deutsche Post of the GDR, the Deutsche Bundespost, along with the Deutsche Bundespost Berlin, and are now the Deutsche Post AG.
context_section_description: Early postage from about 1887 or 1888 consisted of common contemporary German stamps and is only recognized by the post office cancellation stamp as having been used in a colony. Such stamps are known as "Vorläufer" (forerunner) stamps. In the next step regular stamps were used with overprints indicating the name of the territory. Generally by 1896 and thereafter overprinted stamps were issued by the German authorities for all colonies: German South-West Africa, German New Guinea, Kiautschou, Togo, Samoa, Marshall Islands, Mariana Islands, Caroline Islands, German East Africa and Kamerun. By about 1900 the yacht issue was introduced for the various colonial territories which had a uniform appearance depicting the imperial yacht SMY Hohenzollern. After Germany lost control of its colonies in the course of World War I, overprinted yacht stamps were temporarily used by the new colonial rulers.
caption: Caroline Islands, Mi #19
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