I will try to focus these additions upon the strictly postal-historical aspects, as the historical and political ones were, and still are, subject of discussion not always very 'academic'. I will, therefore, make only two initial specifics:-

The theory of "vacant and depopulated" Transylvania after the Romans withdrawal is an absurd speculation (due to the relative lack of archaeological material from that period), but intensively used by revisionist propaganda.

The Ottoman Turks never retreated from Romania because there never was an occupation as such, but rather only a vassal status of the Romanian Principalities towards the Ottoman Empire, which ended with the 1877-1878 Russian-Romanian-Turkish War (when Romania gained its full independence). A real Turkish occupation was, for instance, that of Hungary 1541-1699.

1. The Military Occupation of the Northern Transylvania

Vienna's Award of 30 August 1940 (mediated by Germany and Italy) forced Romania to cede Northern Transylvania to Hungary. The Romanian civilian and military authorities had, in the western zones, only four days to withdraw (between 1 - 4 September).

Two Hungarian armies took part in the occupation of the territory - the 2nd Army (102,000 men) which operated in the Nagyvárad-Kolozsvár area , and the 1st Army (208,000 men) operating to the north east of the 2nd Army.
Their advance into Transylvania was planned for nine days, starting on 5 September 1940. The first Hungarian unit passed the frontier at Maramarossziget on 5 September at 7 a.m. The occupation was planned to be accomplished on 13 September, by midnight. In order to meet these goals the Hungarians sent ahead, from the Koloszvar-Des-Naszod line, the Fast Army Corps (Gyorshadtest) towards Septiszentgyörgy The rear units did not complete this occupation until 18 September1940.

There were nine forwarding stages, with 40-80 km to be completed each day.
The stages and the main occupied towns were:

I: 5 September- Nagykároly, Szatmarnémeti, Maramarossziget, Aknasugatag.
II-III: 6-7 September – Nagyvárad, Nagyszalonta, Szilágysomlyo, Nagybánya, Naszod, Margitta, Borsa.
IV: 8 September - Zilah, Des, Bethlen, Beszterce.
V:9 September- Bánffyhunyad, Szamosújvár, Szaszregen.
VI: 10 September- Marosvásárhely, Parajd, Gyergyoszentmiklos.
VII: 11 September- Kolozsvár, Székelyudvarhely, Székelykeresztur, Csikszereda.
VIII: 12 September – Barót, Csik zone.
IX: 13 September- Sepsiszentgyörgy, Kezdivasarhely.

The towns with VISSZATÉRT cancels are underlined so one can compare their occupation day with their cancel's first day of use (see the list of VISSZATERT cancels).

The Hungarian military units provide some interesting postal items, for example when they used their own propaganda postcards, specially issued for this occupation (Figs. 2 & 3).

Fig.2: Special Field Postcard of the 31st Honvéd Regiment, illustrating 'Greater Hungary' (with the Transylvania territory included). This card was mailed from Field Post Office 11 on 4 September 1940, one day before the troops crossed the frontier.

Fig. 3: Special Field Postcard of the 1st Honvéd Regiment 'Maria Tereza', illustrating a Hungarian soldier marching towards 'Erdely' (= Transylvania). Mailed through the same FPO on 18 September, when the unit was located 80 km from Szátmarnémeti, as the sender writes.

2. The Railway Post.

There were some changes in the railway's network from Northern Transylvania, after the 1918 union, as follows:

The main modification was the construction, between 1920-1924 (with the official opening day 27 May 1924), of the line Salonta (Nagyszalonta) – Ciumeghiu – Nădab (see the present map on page 93 of Mervyn Benford's book, where the line represents a fragment of the '310' route). Thus the previous Hungarian lines Kötegyan – Nagyvárad and Ketegyhaza – Sântana (both discontinued by the new frontier) were linked so that a direct communication Oradea-Arad (parallel to the frontier) was open.

The Romanians built, between 1935 - 1938 the official opening 18.12.l938, the Ilva Mică (Kisilva) - Vatra Dornei line, which linked Transylvania to Bucovina.

The Hungarians built, between 1.04.1941- 11.10.1942, (official opening 5.12.1942) the line Sărătel-Deda (see map) in order to provide a direct link between Kolozsvár and Marosvásarhely and between Kolozsvár and Sepsiszentgyörgy (this is the line whose story was mentioned by Mervyn Benford on Page 96).

The Hungarians built the 16 Km long Lechinta (Szászlekence)- Vile Tecii (Nagyida) line too (opening day 15 December 1941), which provides another direct connection from Kolozsvár to Marosvásárhely.

Finally, the Romanians built, in two stages, 1 .7.1939-30.08.1940 and 1.03.1948-28.12.1949, the line Salva (Szalva) – Viseu (Felsövisó), which linked the Maramaros region to the rest of Romania.

The problems of the Romanian Railway Post's organisation (TPOs, routes, periods of functioning) can be, now, well enough detailed, as a documented book was published in 1995 by Mr. Călin Marinescu in Bucharest ("The Railway Travelling Post in Romania 1869-1994").

In table 1 you can see all the TPOs from, in or towards Northern Transylvania territory: In the first column the TPOs route as it was on 30 August 1940; in the second column are given the new routes for same TPO after the occupation (closed routes because entirely now on Hungarian territory or a new shortened route, generally up to the new frontier). Nearly all these places can be found on the map.

As the cancels were not modified according to the changes of routes one can find interesting (and scarce) items circulated in Romania after the occupation (from September) but bearing an old postmark, with the name of the place at that time in the ceded territory (for example a postcard circulated from Timisoara to Arad through TPO 273, but stamped with the cancel "273 / TIMISOARA - ORADEA").

Only in May 1941 did a reorganisation of the TPO network take place and all the postmarks still in use were replaced by new appropriate examples with the correct routes.

One must note that the Romanian TPO system suffered many reorganisations during the years and it is necessary to correlate the TPO number and the route with the date. For example, some of the TPO routes mentioned by Meivyn Benford on page 91 were assignments not valid in August 1940 (when TPO No.11 was assigned to Bucuresti – Brasov route, TPO 101 to Galati – Bârlad, TPO 165 and 167 were Bessarabian routes, at that moment suppressed as Bessarabia was occupied by the USSR in June 1940).

To end such examples, the above TPOs have the assignments mentioned in the book as follows: TPO 11 in 1932, TPO 161 between 1979-1994, TPO 165 between 1965-1994, and TPO 167 between 1977 - 1982. Further, the TPOs were on the routes mentioned on page 104 as follows: TPO 161/2 1979-1994, TPO 165/166 1965-1994, TPO 167/168 1974-1977, TPO 361/362 1965-1994.

The story of RĂZBOIENI railway station is indeed a little confused because it lies at about mid-distance between two places, Székelykocsard (Cucerdea, today Lunca Muresului, with 1560 inhabitants in 1900), and Székelyföldvár (Feldioara, today Războieni - Cetate, with 952 inhabitants in 1900). The Hungarians considered (up to 1918) this station as belonging to the first place (it was at that time named Székelykocsard P.U.), but the Romanians named it afterwards with the second place's name (so it became Războieni Railway Station).

I think there is confusion about MAROSFÖ railway station. In fact Marosfö is now the Romanian spa Izvorul Muresului, which is 15 km north of TOMESTI (Csikszenttamas). The place is in former CSIK county (today Harghita county) and as it is 97 km SE of Deda (railway distance) it has nothing to do with the newly built segment Sărătel-Deda. (see above).

Regarding Hungarian TPO cancels used in Northern Transylvania, obviously the excellent Monografia (Volume VI) gives the details.

However, there is a postmark type not recorded in this volume; it was reported only in the first volume of the same Monografia (at page 549 as Type 'Mp.Pt-Vy'). But the work of identitying the routes still waits to be done for this type, as Volume I provided only very general information about shape, the limits of periods of use, and total number of examples. I have found so far three difterent cancels of 'Mp.Pt-Vy' used in Northern Transylvania; as follows:-

- 302 "T" (with branch letter "B"?) used between 7 June 1942 and 10 January 1943, on mail sent from Dés to Beszterce (which confirms the routing Budapest-Beszterce for this TPO number).

- 304 "M" (branch lefter "Bp") used on 12 October 1943 (Fig. 3), which is the latest date of use seen so far for this type, towards that recorded by the Monografia at least). Here the route Budapest-Kolozsvár is confirmed as well.

-305 "T" (branch letter "F") used between 12-18 November 1942 on mail sent from Maramarossziget to Budapest (so confirming the route Körösmezö – Nagykároly - Budpapest)o another Northern Transylvanian TPO cancel from type "21" (or 'Mps-Xy', according to the Monografia):

-276 "M" used on 9 July 1944 (which is again the latest date of use for 'Mps-Xy' cancels compared with that of the Monografia date of 17 May 1944), on mail from Gyimesbűkk to Sepsiszentgyörgy, which seems to be a new route number used on the railway Gyimesbűkk-Csikszereda. (Fig.4)

To end this chapter, one must say that at pages 97-99 of Mervyn Benford's book the following new routes must be inserted:-

-No 34 and 308 (at type "17")

-No 33, 34 (at type "18")

These are routes which passed through Northern Transylvanian territory, between Maramarossziget and Visóvölgy, even if they have no mention of Transylvanian towns in their text.