To compress several centuries of history into a couple sentences, what is now modern-day Iraq fell under Ottoman control in 1533 and, more or less, remained a part of the Empire until the end of the First World War. The administrative sub-divisions changed around on occasion, but in its final configuration (from 1831 onwards) Iraq¹ was divided into three vilayets, each named after their largest city: Basra, Baghdad and Mosul. Baghdad vilayet was approximately twice the size of the other two regions.

A public postal service was established in the Empire in 1840. Iraq was not generously served by it: in 1863, when the Empire's postage stamps were first issued, there were just four post offices in all of Iraq (at Baghdad, Basra, Mosul, and Kirkuk).² By 1914 there were 55 post offices or thereabouts.³

When postage stamps were actually introduced to Iraq is perhaps an open question (to me, anyway). As noted above, the inaugural Ottoman stamp issue appeared in 1863. Proud meanwhile states that stamps weren’t used in Iraq until 1868.⁴ A delay between stamps first appearing in the Constantinople GPO and their diffusion to provincial offices feels plausible, but perhaps not one as long as five years. “Triple box” cancellations dated 1281 (Gregorian 1865) were used at Baghdad, Kirkuk and Mosul, which obviously implies stamps were available in those cities in at that date. 1865 is also the date stamps of the famous “Duloz” design were first issued. So 1865 is probably the correct starting-point.

Throughout the whole Ottoman period regular Ottoman stamps were used in Iraq without any differentiation. The only peculiarity specific to Iraq was the authorisation of bisects in 1890-1892:⁵ at Baghdad, 2 piastre stamps were cut in half and overprinted to meet a local shortage of 1 piastre stamps. This exercise appears to have been sincere, and done with at least some degree of official authorisation,⁶ and covers bearing these stamps did pass through the mails, including internationally, without incident.^6A The exercise had also, so far as is known, been completed before the philatelic papers got wind of it.^6B Nevertheless, these stamps are somewhat more common as neat on-piece specimens than they perhaps ought to be. We underestimate the amount of collectors within the Ottoman Empire, perhaps.

The British had had a commercial presence in Iraq since the 18th Century and by the early 19th Century there was a British consul at Baghdad and a lower-ranking official in/around Basra. Between them they ran an efficient postal operation of their own: a mail ship ran between Bombay and Basra, and mounted messengers were hired to carry post between Basra and Constantinople, with an optional detour via Baghdad. In 1868 this service was integrated into the Indian civil postal service and from the 1st January of that year regular Indian stamps were used.⁷

The Ottoman post in Iraq was fairly haphazard in its earlier days, and the locals regarded the British post as a safer, more reliable service.⁸ The Ottomans, presumably recognising the deficiencies of their own service, were initially tolerant of the British one.

The Ottoman post however cleaned up its act somewhat and was admitted to the Universal Postal Union in 1875. This saw new postmarks introduced: bilingual (Ottoman and French, or sometimes French alone), and with the date given according to both the Ottoman civil calendar and the Gregorian calendar. ⁹

Regarding their admission to the Postal Union as international validation of the quality of their own service, the Ottoman government began to demand the removal of the foreign posts in the Empire.¹⁰ Attempts were made to, variously, hinder the operation of the British post and to compete with it, but (to cut a long story short) the British offices remained open.¹¹ It became Ottoman policy to treat mail from British Iraqi post offices to Ottoman destinations as unpaid, and liable to postage due. I don't have a start date for this beyond that it was probably sometime in the 1880s.

The First World War broke out in July 1914 and, while the Ottoman Empire was initially neutral, its sympathies were clearly leaning towards the Central Powers. With tensions rising, on 19th September the Ottoman authorities ordered that the British post offices in Iraq be closed by 1st October,¹² and they were indeed shuttered on the 30th September.¹³ Britain declared war on the Ottoman Empire on the 5th November and immediately went on the offensive: on 22nd November Basra was captured by the Indian Expeditionary Force and the post office was re-opened in December.¹⁴

The British began to push up in the direction of Baghdad. The Indian Expeditionary Force had its own system of field post offices (outside the scope of this website, for the time being) and used Indian stamps overprinted with "I.E.F.". Civil post offices were gradually opened in British-controlled territory for non-military use: these used regular Indian stamps and were run by seconded Indian officials together with local assistants.¹⁵

I unfortunately know very little about the operation of the Ottoman posts in Iraq during the First World War: presumably services continued to function in some sort of restricted condition. Coles and Walker report a few new postmark varieties appearing in the war years, plus a new Baghdad sub-office “Iraq Headquarters”. As the Ottomans retreated northwards they fastidiously cleared out their post offices before abandoning them.¹⁶

By late 1915 the British had advanced to within 30 miles of Baghdad, but were checked by the Ottomans at the Battle of Ctesiphon. They retreated to Kut-el-Amara and were besieged there. Attempts to relieve the British defenders were beaten back by the Ottomans and, ravaged by disease and running out of supplies, the British surrendered on the 29th April 1916. Over 13,000 British and Indian soldiers were taken prisoner in one of the worst defeats for the British during the war. And we leave the British story here for now.

And the stamps themselves, finally. This is a rather specialist area (or, I suppose, two rather specialist areas) and not my main focus. I do keep an eye out for specimens though, and the images up top represent my haphazard collection of this era as it currently stands. Condition of these is a little variable, as can be seen — a large hinge is all that’s holding the Kirkuk Duloz stamp together. The inverted overprint on the Kut-el-Amara stamp is a nice extra. There’s also some additional Ottoman postmarks can be seen on the covers page. Reference numbers are Coles & Walker for the Ottoman postmarks and Proud for the British ones. Ottoman date ranges are from Coles & Walker (unless there's a legible date on the postmark) and British ones are from either Proud or Gibbons if Gibbons gives a larger range.

1. I use "Iraq" throughout this page and the next few as an abbreviation for "the territory which is presently known as Iraq". During this time the area was generally known to English-speakers as Mesopotamia (or "Turkish Arabia", etc., occasionally). "The Iraq" (with definite article) seems to have existed as a specialist term -- we see e.g. Gertrude Bell use it. The British began issuing revenue stamps for the occupied Iraqi territory in 1915: where they bore the place-name in English this was always rendered as "Iraq", and this of course was the spelling used on the postage stamps when they appeared. In the India Office correspondence the conventional spelling used is "Irak" until c. later 1918 when "Iraq" bcomes more common. One encounters differing opinions as to whether "Iraq" was a relevant concept to the Ottomans and to the locals during the Ottoman era. Received wisdom is that Iraq is a wholly British concoction, but I've seen it convincingly argued that to some degree a shared "Iraqi" identity existed among the inhabitants of the three vilayets during the later Ottoman period, and that the Ottoman authorities considered some matters on an Iraq-wide basis. Certainly the term was in use administratively: for a philatelic example see the Ottoman "Iraq Headquarters" postmark pictured above. See Nahar Muhammed Nur, Iraq is not Artificial: Iraqi Trends and the Refutation of the Artificial State Hypothesis (2018) for much more on this point.
2. I take this from Wikipedia in good faith.
3. Coles & Walker give 52 post towns, plus an extra three Baghdad sub-offices.
4. Proud, 132.
5. Proud at 132 gives the dates as 1879 and 1882, which I think must be incorrect.
6. Coles & Walker, 19.

6A. Giray & Zywietz, Baghdad Provisionals Revisited (2017), 47.

6B. Giray & Zywietz, 46.

7. Gibbons Middle East (2009), 99. Proud at 131 gives 1878 but 1868 elsewhere.
8. Proud, 27.
9. Proud, 10.
10. The British post was the only foreign post operating in Iraq, but there were several others active in the Levant etc.
11. Proud explores this in as much detail as anybody might wish: the main points of contention —beyond the bare fact that the British offices existed— were the Ottoman belief that that the Baghdad office was failing to pay customs duties on packages it received from India, and that the Basra office had erected a pillar-box some distance away from its actual premises.
12. Heller, British Policy towards the Ottoman Empire, 1908–1914 (1983), 145.
13. Date per Gibbons Middle East (2009), 99 and 100.
14. Gibbons Middle East (2009), 100.
15. India Office File 1323/1917, Part 1, 208r.
16. Wilson, Loyalties: Mesopotamia 1914-1917 (1930), 321.