For a long time, these two stamps have bugged me.  They are very common Hong Kong definitive stamps from the King George V era with single line overprint “CHINA”.

My problem was that Michel stamp catalog did not mention anything about these stamps with overprint. Thus I stored them with other HK stamps, though I knew for sure it was not the correct place. Lately however I took a look of Stanley Gibbons catalogue, and bingo. These are examples of British Post Offices in China.

The overprint history began in 1917.  Due to the difference in exchange rates between the Hong Kong Dollar and the Chinese currency, some Hong Kong stamps were overprinted with “CHINA” to be used exclusively in the China Treaty Ports. When the China Treaty Ports closed in November 1922, overprinted stamps were used only at the Crown Colony of Wei Hai Wei until its closure in 1930.  A total of 27 different Hong Kong stamps with this overprint exists, these two (Michel catalog numbers #3 & #6) happen to be most commonly found.

And yes, these can be found on Michel too (if you know where to look them. ). You have to pick up the Europe stamp catalog containing Great Britain, then go to Foreign British Post offices, and voilà!

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