European Railway Insurance Stamps - Information

According to legend, in 1905 a Hungarian timber merchant, Max von Engel, was waiting to board a train when a shower of sparks fell from the steam engine onto his luggage standing nearby on the platform. This narrowly avoided accident gave him the brainwave to imagine a Europe-wide insurance scheme to cover such hazards. In 1907 he joined with Carl von Thieme, founder of the Munich Re insurance group, to establish the Europaische Reisegepack-Versicherungs-AG. In the 1920s the scheme was extended across 22 countries in Europe. This was a pioneer example of European financial integration. In the postwar era, a similar network of national groups and affiliates continued the scheme, which in 2012 came under the umbrella of the ERV insurance group. Stamps were always affixed to documents as proof of insurance , and usually printed in a common style. Thus, this little example of European integration has been around for 100 years, and makes an interesting but little documented field of collecting. We are co-ordinating work on providing listings of what is known. These will appear in coming months in this section. There are no printer's records for dates of issue, so chronological order can only be found from date cancels or use on documents. We invite cooperation from interested collectors. Any information or scans received will gladly be acknowledged.