586. British Royal Family Depicted Again On Set From "Anti-colonial"Gambia; Bogus Issues.

  In Blog 585 I failed to illustrate the miniature sheet which has been issued by IGPC with the name of Tuvalu inscribed on it which includes 8 "stamps" all on the subject of "The Longest Reigning Monarchs of The United Kingdom" presumably to tie in with the achievement of Queen Elizabeth II in becoming the longest reigning monarch on 9 September 2015. It is not clear why this sheetlet was put out 4 months before the event especially as it identifies the Queen as being second on the list behind Queen Victoria. Perhaps the agency hopes to double its income from the issue by re-releasing it in September with an altered inscription which will identify Elizabeth II as the longest reigning monarch.

  In 2013 the despotic ruler of The Gambia, President Yahya Jammah, famously withdrew his country from its membership of The Commonwealth stating that The Gambia "would never be a member of a neo-colonial organisation" and that "it will never be a party to any institution which represents an extension of colonialism" (see Blog 310). This decision however does not appear to extend to prohibiting its philatelic agents, IGPC, from cashing in on one of the great imperial institutions which Jammah so despises - the royal family of the imperial power which ruled The Gambia for decades. Hence IGPC has released a sheetlet and a miniature sheet to commemorate the birth of Princess Charlotte of Cambridge, 4th in line to the throne of The United Kingdom, and various members of the British royal family are depicted on the stamps. I wonder if President Professor Sheikh Doctor Alhaji Jammah knows that these stamps have been produced in his country's name for its citizens to use on their mail. I suspect not.

  Addendum (22 June 2015). Since writing the above it has occurred to me that The Gambia celebrated its 50th anniversary of Independence on 18 February 2015. Despite trawling around the Internet, I can not, as yet (4 months after the event), find any news of any postage stamps having been issued to commemorate the anniversary which is clearly of great significance to the small nation though not, apparently, despite Sheikh Jammah's opinion, as important as the birth of Princess Charlotte!

Jammah at the national celebrations for The Gambia's 50th anniversary of Independence.

  Malta Post will issue a set of 3 stamps on 16 June 2015 as part of the SEPAC omnibus series. The theme of the issue is local culture and the designs depict scenes from local festivals - the Festa, the Annual Regatta and the festivities of Easter Sunday. The colourful designs are from photographs by Daniel Cilla and the stamps were lithographed by Printex:-

   Norfolk Island Post issued a miniature sheet on 24 April 2015 to commemorate the centenary of Norfolk Islanders' participation in the Gallipoli landings. Of the 160 eligible Norfolk Islanders, 81 enlisted to fight with the Anzac forces during the First World War and 16 of them fought at Gallipoli. The miniature sheet depicts the local war memorial which was inaugurated on Anzac Day 1929:-

  The next issue to be released on 25 June 2015 by Pos Malaysia will be a set of 3 stamps and 1 miniature sheet on the subject of "Herons and Bitterns":-

  The latest philatelic products to be put out by Stamperija are stated to have a date of issue of 24 May 2015. The issues are inscribed "Solomon Islands" and are on the usual variety of subjects, mostly of no relevance to the islands.  There are 10 subsets each made up of a "sheetlet" of 4 different "stamps" and 1 accompanying "miniature sheet"; the subjects are:- Tiger Woods (US golfer), the 2015 Africa Cup of Nations football championship, Ludwig van Beethoven, Centenary of the Endurance Expedition, Pope John Paul II, Nelson Mandela, Concorde, Former US President Abraham Lincoln, Centenary of the (British) Women's Institute and Centenary of the Battle of Ypres.

  Bogus Issues.

  Bogus issues have appeared on the philatelic market for many years. They are illegal, have no postal validity and are worthless. I have noticed that the Delcampe auction site currently has for sale a number of bogus "issues" inscribed with the names of some Commonwealth territories. They are being offered for sale by vendors in Russia and Spain and all items are on subjects relevant to Russia. All items are imperforate. 

  On offer is a "sheetlet" of 4 different "stamps" plus 7 accompanying "miniature sheets" inscribed Malawi which commemorate ostensibly the Ice Hockey World Championship of 2015. There is also a "sheetlet" of 4 "stamps" and 7 "miniature sheets" which commemorate the Ice Hockey Championship with the inscription "Kingdom of Tonga" on offer for an incredible $39.30c - Philatelic Collector Inc. will not be pleased to see one of their client territories among the victims of these fraudsters. 

  Ironically, a Stamperija territory - Uganda - has its name inscribed on 2 "sets" of these items - a set of 3 "miniature sheets" which commemorate the FIFA World Cup to be held in Russia in 2018 and 1 "sheetlet" of 4 different "stamps" plus 6 "miniature sheets" on the subject of the 50th anniversary of the cosmonaut Alexei Leonov becoming the first man to walk in space. Another Stamperija client, Solomon Islands, is also caught up in this fraud with 7 Ice Hockey Championships "miniature sheets" and 1 "sheetlet" of 4 "stamps" being offered for sale for a total of $39.30c.

  The most surprising territory to appear on this list of victims is Zimbabwe with a "sheetlet" of 4 different "stamps" and 7 accompanying "miniature sheets" on the subject of the Ice Hockey World Championship all being offered for sale again for a cheeky $39.30c. All of these issues are offered on the auction website as though they are genuine postage stamps. They clearly are not. Many new issues being offered on the philatelic market by foreign philatelic agencies which are licensed to do so by some postal administrations are detrimental to stamp collecting and the presence of these bogus items being offered for sale on reputable auction websites only makes matters worse. The description of the items on the website makes no attempt to indicate their bogus nature. Caveat emptor.

  Examples of the bogus issues:-

Malawi bogus issue

"Kingdom of Tonga" bogus issue.

Uganda bogus issue.

Uganda bogus issue.

Solomon Islands bogus issue.

Zimbabwe bogus issue.

559. Israel Stamp Commemorates Jewish Contribution In Gallipoli.

  It has been suggested from time to time that Israel may join The Commonwealth. This seems unlikely but the country then known as Palestine was under British rule from the end of the First World War to 1948. Israel issued a single stamp on 14 April 2015 to commemorate the centenary of the establishment of the Zion Mule Corps which served with the British and Allied forces in the Gallipoli Campaign in 1915.

  The Zion Mule Corps resulted from the acceptance in Alexandria by the British in February 2015 of a plan by Zeev Jabotinsky and Joseph Trompeldor to establish a military unit from Russian Jewish émigrés from Palestine to help to drive out the Ottomans from Palestine. The British commander, General Maxwell, was not legally able to enlist foreign nationals as fighting troops but could set up a volunteer transport Mule Corps. Trompeldor recruited volunteers from those Jews in Egypt who had been deported there by the Ottomans and 650 of them formed the Zion Mule Corps with 562 of its members being sent to Gallipoli in mid-April 2015 to carry water to the troops.

  The Zion Mule Corps arrived at Cape Hellas on 28 to 29 April, just 3 to 4 weeks after it had been raised. The Zion Mule Corps was landed under artillery fire. Private M. Grouschkowky was awarded a Distinguished Conduct Medal after preventing his mules from stampeding while under heavy bombardment at Krithia on 5 May. Despite being wounded in both arms he delivered necessary ammunition to the troops. Captain Trumpeldor who was second-in-command of the Mule Corps was shot but refused to leave the battlefield.

  The Mule Corps was returned to Alexandria on 10 January 1916 and disbanded on 26 May. The Mule Corps had experienced 13 fatalities during the Gallipoli Campaign. In August 1917 a Jewish Battalion was established as the 38th Battalion of the Royal Fusilers and was made up of British volunteers, the Mule Corps and many Russian Jews. In April 1918 the 39th Battalion was raised in Nova Scotia mainly made of Jews who lived in North America and the 40th Battalion was established largely made up of Palestinian Jews and captured Ottoman Jews. The 41st and 42nd Battalions were established at Plymouth as depot battalions.

  The 38th, 39th and 40th Battalions were involved in fighting the Ottomans north of Jerusalem and in the Jordan Valley. In September 1918 the Jewish Legion, as the five battalions become known, fought against the Ottomans at the Battle of Megiddo which was a decisive victory in the Allied War with the Ottoman Empire.

  The new Israel stamp shows the Zion Mule Corps at Gallipoli with the tab showing the flag of Israel and the Union Jack (shown at head of this blog).

  One stamp which has up until now completely escaped my awareness of it, is the old $2.50 Tanager definitive stamp with the old value cancelled by a large rectangle and the new value printed above it unlike the first which merely has the new value printed on it. This is said to have been issued during 2014. Both surcharges were carried out by Benji Quick Quality Printing Services:-

New surcharge.

Original surcharge.

  The roll out of IAR Post And Go kiosks in the Royal Mail Enquiry offices of various English towns continues with 3 more being set up at the end of April 2015. The offices at which the machines are sited are:-

  M004 - Kingston upon Thames - from 27 April 2015,

  M005 - Croydon - from 28 April 2015 and 

  M006 - Doncaster - from 29 April 2015.

  These machines will dispense stamps in the Machin Head and Machin Head Second Class designs and will not have location identifying inscriptions as was the case with the Crewe and Bradford North locations for a limited period.

  Meanwhile it has also been announced that the Jersey Post IAR kiosk JE01 will travel to London to be used at the Europhilex Philatelic Exhibition from 13 to 16 May 2015. The kiosk will dispense Jersey Flag labels with an additional inscription applied to them, "Europhilex 2015/Penny Black 175". Jersey Flag labels with the same inscription applied to them produced by the back office machine B002 will be sold by the Jersey Philatelic Bureau. JE01 will also dispense the Jersey Protected Species labels at the exhibition in London but without an additional inscription.

  India Post issued a single stamp on 21 April 2015 to commemorate the bicentenary of the Old Seminary (Orthodox Theological Seminary) in Kottayam. The seminary is run by the Malankara Orthodox Syrian Church - the St. Thomas Christians who are known as the Malankara Nazranis:-

  Isle Of Man Stamps issued a "Smiler sheet" on 24 April 2015 which contained 10 x £1 stamps with attached labels to commemorate the bicentenary of The Gurkhas serving as part of the British armed forces. The £1 stamp used in the sheetlet was originally issued on 26 February 2015 to commemorate the 70th anniversary of the end of the Second World War. A photograph of Prince Henry of Wales with a Gurkha soldier is featured in the lower border of the sheetlet:-

553. Australia Commemorates Gallipoli, Nevis In Catalogue Appendix, Another Zambia-China Relations Issue.

  Australia Post has issued an excellent set of 5 x 70c stamps on 14 April 2015 which commemorated ANZAC Day. The first Australian to be awarded a Victoria Cross in the First World War, LCPL Albert Jacka, was commemorated on one of the stamps. The issue was made up of 5 gummed stamps, 1 miniature sheet, 1booklet of 10 x 70c self-adhesive stamps and 1 $14.95 prestige booklet.

   The other stamps in the set depict the landing of Australian troops on the Gallipoli beaches on 25 April 1915, Australian troops in Turkish trenches seized during fighting at Lone Pine, Private John Simpson Kirkpatrick of the 3rd Australian Field Ambulance who with his faithful donkey recovered wounded soldiers from the frontline and the evacuation of Australian forces from Gallipoli on 19 December 1915.

  The set was designed by Janet Boschen.

  The Appendix section of the latest edition of Gibbons Stamp Monthly (May 2015) indicates that the Catalogue editor is continuing to consign a number of recent "issues" of Commonwealth territories to the Appendix rather than giving them full listing in the main section of the Catalogue (see Blog 538). The most recently affected territory is Nevis which has had 10 sets banished to the Appendix. Again these seem to be issues of no or extremely remote relevance to the island of Nevis - the editor appears content to include in the main listing issues which have subject matter of strict local or regional relevance or sets where the subject is the British royal family (which of course is also the royal family of the state of St. Kitts- Nevis). Full marks to the Catalogue editor for his attempts to come to grips with the ongoing appalling excessive issuing of stamps by foreign agencies on behalf of some Commonwealth territories. Perhaps now, however, this policy needs to be extended to other postal administrations, such as the offshore British islands, which are also clearly indulging in the excessive release of stamp issues.

  Zampost, the postal administration of Zambia, has issued 6 stamps and 1 miniature sheet to commemorate the 50th anniversary of its "friendship" with China (which I presume to mean the 50th anniversary of its diplomatic relations with The People's Republic Of China). It is an issue which appears to be the latest in a worldwide series of issues of commemorations of various countries' relations with China.

  The sets are usually donated to the relevant states by China itself  - it's a little like receiving a birthday card from someone when in fact you bought the card itself and gave it to them so that they could send it back to you to show how much they like you! 

  These are very interesting issues from the point of view of illustrating what is happening in the world as regards international relations. Interestingly Zambia released a similar issue in 2014 to commemorate the 50th anniversary of China's Red Flag Canal and it appears, philatelically at least, that China-Zambia relations must be very good. Presently, I do not know the date of issue of this set.

  In Blog 535 I mentioned new "Bespoke" airmail postcard stamps released by Universal Mail United Kingdom and I depict these again but in more detail. The stamp strips are dated "12/14". The strip UK0129 is on the subject of the National Railway Museum in York and is bound to be popular with trains-on-stamps enthusiasts:-

 The strip UK0126 has its appeal to those whose taste it is to find modern "celebrities" to be interesting - the strip is sold at the Madame Tussauds Wax Museum and one of the stamps depicts wax models of the former footballer, David Beckham, and his wife who was once a member of a popular female music entertainment group:-

upper stamp - Beckham and pop star wife.

  The strip UK0128 is again of interest to railway enthusiasts as it includes the picture of an early steam engine on one of the stamps:-

547. Gallipoli, Armenia, Poppies, Roses And Muntjacs.

  The events at Gallipoli in 1915 are usually depicted from the British-Australian-New Zealand perspective in a collection of Commonwealth stamps but, as mentioned in Blog 541, an opposing viewpoint was given in a single stamp issued by The Turkish Republic Of Northern Cyprus on one stamp which commemorated the centenary of the Turkish naval victory at Gallipoli. The stamp, depicted above, was designed by GK Sonmezer and printed in lithography. Stamp collecting can certainly broaden one's understanding of the world and help one to realise that history does not necessarily have a single way of seeing past events.

  These points are made equally by another new issue, this time from the postal administration of The Republic Of Cyprus, which is part of a joint issue with Armenia and which recalls another event of 1915 which involved Turkey - then The Ottoman Empire - namely the terrible massacres of the Armenians who lived in Turkey, massacres which widely have become called a genocide. The Cypriot stamp depicts the Melkonian Orphanage in Nicosia/Lefkosa which was founded in 1926 to house 500 orphans of the massacres:-

  It is also interesting to depict the stamp issued by Armenia as its contribution to this joint issue (even though it is not a Commonwealth issue) - the design shows a photograph of the first Armenian orphans to find a home in the orphanage. They are dressed in uniforms and lined up with the school band:-

  Presumably, while The Republic of Cyprus' participation in this joint issue is a way of expressing solidarity with, and sympathy for, the Armenian victims of the 1915 massacres, the issue of the stamp is also a way of publicising philatelically The Cyprus Republic's continuing resistance to the Turkish occupation of northern Cyprus and the existence of the Northern Cyprus Republic. Identifying itself with the victims of the terrible events affecting Armenians in Turkey 100 years ago is an effective way of drawing attention to Cyprus' own feelings about Turkey and what better medium is there to do so than stamps?

  Sri Lanka Post issued 1 stamp on 20 March 2015 to commemorate the 150th anniversary of the National Hospital of Sri Lanka:- 

   Another version of Royal Mail's "Post And Go" stamps with the 2 new tariff values of "Europe up to 100g" and "Worldwide up to 100g" has been offered for sale on an Internet auction site recently.This time it is a "Collectors' set" composed entirely of Poppy stamps. In Blog 545 I reported that I had obtained the new tariff values on the "Symbolic flowers" set from the post office in Sheffield city centre and that of course included the poppy design but the item offered for sale recently was the "poppy only" strip first issued on 21 October 2014 in the run-up to Remembrance Day but with the 2 new values. 

  Thus we have yet another version of the new tariff stamps and to fully demonstrate the difference between these and the symbolic flowers stamps of 6 different designs I guess that collectors need to add a complete strip of the poppy stamps with new values to their collection at a cost of £7.68p making the running grand total cost for Royal Mail issues in 2015 so far listed up to £228.89p.

   It is interesting to note that one of the values in the strip (Worldwide up to 20g) depicted below has a misplaced inscription. As mentioned in Blog 545, I also obtained collectors strips with misprinted inscriptions from one of the 2 kiosks in Sheffield and I can not help feeling that there must be plenty of "Post And Go" stamps around with misprinted inscriptions which makes them vaguely interesting but hardly of any great value.

  On 4 April 2015 I visited the Pinfold Street post office in central Birmingham and obtained a Collectors' strip of the Machin Head "Post And Go" stamps with MA14 code with the new tariff values included in the strip. I was told that this was the only stamp design being dispensed from any of the kiosks in that post office. It has been reported previously that the Machin Head design stamps with new tariff are also being sold with MA13 code.

  The New York-based philatelic agency, IGPC, will issue 1 sheetlet of 4 different stamps and 1 accompanying miniature sheet on the subject of "Roses" on 20 July 2015 with the name of one of its client territories, in this case Montserrat, printed on the items:-

  It's a strange (philatelic) world - I was recently walking with my dog across some fields in the countryside local to where I live when 4 muntjac deer suddenly appeared and ran in front of us away across the field with the dog in hot pursuit. They easily outran her but it was quite interesting to see these creatures suddenly appear within a few score yards of the edge of Britain's second city, Birmingham (though I have seen them well inside the city boundary before). I was reminded of this when looking at one of the stamps issued in a sheetlet of 10 by Bhutan Post during 2014 which I have just added to my collection. The set depicts "Flora and Fauna" of Bhutan, with its mountains and forests, and there, staring out at me from one of the stamps, was a Muntjac in its native home unlike those which had appeared on our walk in the northernmost tip of Worcestershire. Round my way the muntjac is an introduced species but looks just at home as that which appears on the new Bhutanese stamp.

  Despite the muntjacs' appearance in the centre of England, I am not expecting to bump into some of the animals which are featured in the Bhutanese sheetlet such as the Himalayan Black Bear:-

  Nor do I expect to see a Red Panda moving about the trees of one of the local woods:-

  Likewise, I do not have great expectations of viewing a Golden Langur in the local woods:-

  But on the other hand, we do seem to have plenty of primulas:-