236. The Road To Waterloo.

  Ascension will issue a set of 4 stamps on 21 May 2013 as the first part of a series which will commemorate the bicentenary of British settlement of the island. The British occupation took place after the defeat of the French tyrant, Bonaparte, at the Battle of Waterloo and his subsequent exile to St. Helena. Ascension was garrisoned as part of the chain of defences set up to ensure the dictator was not helped to escape from St. Helena - he had caused so much death and destruction across Europe as well as global warfare, just as Hitler was to do 125 years later, that the British needed to take whatever measures they could to ensure that the monster was not let loose again. It is fitting therefore that the first issue of stamps to commemorate the British settlement of Ascension is dedicated to the subject of the creature which made it all necessary - Bonaparte himself.

  These four stamps depict subjects related to the megalomaniac's rise to power:- the 45p shows his wife, Josephine, whom he was to divorce when it became clear that she could not provide him with children (how like England's very own monster, Henry VIII); the 50p shows Bonaparte at the time of his invasion of Italy in 1796; the 60p depicts a scene from his invasion of Egypt in 1798 and the £1.45p depicts him in the role of First Consul of France which he fulfilled from December 1799 to 18 May 1804 when he proclaimed himself to be "Emperor Of France".

  Britain had by then been at war with France, with intermittent brief truces, for more than 10 years and it was to be another 10 years before the world saw the back of the tyrant with his military defeat and exile. War was fought across the world, European countries crushed by Bonaparte and Britain, just as in 1940, had its moments when it was forced to stand alone against the monster and his allies. St. Helena, the Atlantic island of his eventual exile, has issued numerous stamps over the years on various subjects related to Bonaparte. One of the earliest and finest was that issued on 5 May 1971 which commemorated the 150th anniversary of Bonaparte's death and which depicts Bonaparte in exile on St. Helena, defeated but still staring out arrogantly from the picture.

  The road to defeat at Waterloo has been mapped out by issues from other Commonwealth countries - the coronation of Josephine as Empress Of France by the megalomaniac himself (he had forced Pope Pius VII to attend his coronation as an onlooker and later, when The Pope opposed his ambitions, he arrested and imprisoned the pontiff until his own first defeat in 1814) was depicted on a stamp from Cameroun which was issued in 1969. Pipe Pius is shown at the right side of the picture, seated immediately behind his tormentor. The painting was by Jacques-Louis David:-

  On 16 January 2007, St. Helena issued a stamp which depicted Bonaparte in imperial garb, again staring out of the picture with an expression of complete arrogance. The stamp was one of a set of three plus a miniature sheet containing all 3 values, titled "The Napoleons", the others showing the French rulers, Napoleon II and Naploleon III and excellently designed by Gyula Vasarhelyi and lithographed by BDT International:-

  Great Britain's chances of surviving Bonaparte's desire to rule the world, were hugely increased by the defeat of the French fleet and that of their Spanish allies at the Battle of Trafalgar in 1805. St. Helena issued 2 sets of stamps to commemorate the bicentenary of this nation-saving victory on 10 May 2005 (a set of 6 stamps and 1 miniature sheet) and 21 October 2005 3 stamps, two values of which are depicted below).

The Battle of Trafalgar

Admiral Lord Nelson, British Commander at Trafalgar.

  On 1 November 1980, St. Helena commemorated The Duke Of Wellington, who led the British forces at the Battle of Waterloo in 1815 where they, with their Prussian allies, finally brought Bonaparte's career to an end. The set of 2 stamps commemorated the 175th anniversary of the Duke's own visit to St. Helena and the 30p value depicted a portrait of "The Iron Duke":-

The new Ascension set begins what promises to be an excellent philatelic account not just of the establishment of a small isolated British colony but also of the rise and downfall of a monster. As we approach the bicentenary year in 2015, we will doubtless see increasing numbers of stamp issues on this subject.

235. Samoa before Philatelic Collector Inc.

As described in Blog no 205, the New York-based philatelic agency, Philatelic Collector Inc, took over responsibility for all aspects of the production, promotion and sale of the stamps of Samoa in December 2012. To some people this seemed to be a rather worrying development since in the last 3 years or so the same agency had gained control of the stamp issues of Cook Islands and Tonga with the result that
a relatively large number of stamps, which some people thought to be excessive, and some with very high face values, were produced on behalf of those territories. Samoa appeared to be on the same route as Tonga and Cook Islands with the rapid issuing of 3 sets of rather poorly designed and printed stamps. 

  Prior to this development Samoa seemed to have had a pleasingly conservative new issue programme which included a number of truly excellent designs prepared for the territory by New Zealand Post. But for several years the situation was clearly deteriorating in that the number of stamps issued declined greatly and those that did appear seemed to be produced by unusual sources for Samoa, for instance the peony and 2008 Olympics miniature sheets which appeared to have originated in China and were presumably donated, or perhaps sponsored, by China since they were connected to events in China. It looked as though the Samoa Post Office, like a number of other territories, could not afford to pay for the production of new stamps although they pulled out all the stops to commemorate the highly important 50th anniversary of Independence with an excellent set from New Zealand Post.
  In that context then, the intervention by Philatelic Collector Inc. is a sort of bail out for the Samoa Post Office - at least they will have stamps prepared for them even if they are not necessarily what they and stamp collectors would like to see. Evidence of the need for some sort of solution to what is clearly a financial problem for the Samoa Post Office which brought them to the door of Philatelic Collector Inc.  is also provided by 2 further issues made in 2009 and 2011 about which I was not aware until I looked at the shop website of Steven Zirinsky, a great Pacific area expert. There I found he was illustrating and offering for sale some covers which were stamped with an issue which was released on 27 April 2009 to commemorate the 90th anniversary of ILO. 

The stamps are very atypical of what we have seen from Samoa in recent years and clearly the commemoration of this particular anniversary is rather surprising given the huge range of subjects which the Samoa Post office has not commemorated in recent years - one really struggles to believe that the 90th anniversary of the International Labour Organisation is of such great significance
to the territory that it warrants a stamp issue more than a good number of other subjects we could think of. Perhaps this was also a donated or sponsored issue. I have not seen it advertised by any dealers on E Bay or Delcampe, nor has it been mentioned in any British philatelic magazines and Stanley Gibbons do not seem to be aware of it as it has not been listed in the new issue supplement of Gibbons Stamp 
Monthly. Nor have I seen any British new issue dealers offering it for sale but I do see that the issue has been give a number by Scott  and there are in fact 4 values in the set (Scott nos 1122 - 25). I have found a joint Samoa-ILO statement from 2009 which announced the issue of the stamps and included an illustration of them and I show this above with Steven Zirinsky's website cover illustration as well as a close-up of a stamp on one of the covers. I have bought (and rapidly received) one of the covers from Steven Zirinsky as well as another item of which I had not previously been aware - a set of 8 surcharges produced in 2010 or 2011, shown below:-

As can be seen, these are surcharges on the Millenium commemorative stamps and I think the need to issue surcharges suggests that stamp availability in Samoa must have been becoming difficult. Again, I have seen no mention of this issue in any of the British philatelic media but I see that Scott has acknowledged the issue and allocated them the catalogue numbers 1129 - 36.

  Clearly, Samoa needed to go somewhere to continue to be able to have stamps available for postal usage and the new agency which they use provides them with stamps and if we stamp collectors do not like the stamps we really do not have to buy them. So far, I have bought the Christmas sheetlet since it was reasonably priced and the waterfall issue but chosen not to buy the Chinese New Year issue because it really does not seem to have any relevance to Samoa and, in my opinion, the design is pretty poor. I have long given up striving for completion but am perfectly satisfied with a representative collection of issues which tell me about the country whose stamps I am buying. However, I find it satisfying and thrilling when I discover what are to me previously unknown issues, as I have on Steven Zirinsky's site and now I have a new goal - that of tracking down a set of the ILO stamps. What fun!

  Meanwhile, there are new issues from Guernsey. On 29 May 2013 the Guernsey Post Office will issue a set of 6 stamps and a £12.36 prestige booklet with the name of the island of Alderney  printed on them which commemorate the 60th anniversary of the coronation of Queen Elizabeth II:-

I have previously mentioned the miniature sheet which was issued on 20 February 2013 and which depicts the gold post box on the island of Sark which commemorates the island's 2012 Olympic gold medal winner, Carl Hester who won the medal in the Team Dressage event. It is an attractive item and reasonably priced at just £1 though this unusually low face value for a Channel Islands miniature sheet may have something to do with the fact that the Guernsey Post Office generously gave away these miniature sheets entirely free of charge to their standing order customers. The item was designed by Bridget Yabsley and lithographed by BDT International Security Printers:-

On 29 May 2013, yet another island of the Guernsey Bailiwick - Herm - will be featured on a set of 6 stamps designed by Bridget Yabsley and lithographed by Lowe Martin:-

A set of 6 stamps and 1 miniature sheet which combines all 6 values will be released by Guernsey on 8 May 2013 as its contribution to the annual "Europa" issues. All values depict postal vehicles which is the 2013 Europa theme but strangely and unnecessarily the set does not only feature vehicles in Guernsey but also in Germany, France, Great Britain and USA:-

Papua New Guinea continues to issue interesting sets which depict all aspects of local life - culture, scenery, wildlife, social and political aspects, and I find its issues thoroughly worthwhile except that there are too many issues which are too expensive and of course there is also the problem of the issues which its foreign philatelic agent forces on it which usually are entirely to do with American culture and nothing to do with Papua New Guinea. Actually, the foreign-themed items do not bother me that much because I have never bought any of them which leaves me with a fascinating collection of local issues which is like an encyclopaedia of Papua New Guinea. For the record, the latest foreign agency issue was released on 13 March 2013 and commemorated the former President of The USA, Kennedy, who was assassinated in 1963:-

The issue took the form of 4 stamps, a miniature sheet containing 4 different stamps and a miniature sheet which contained a single stamp.

With that issue behind us, we can celebrate the local Papuan new issues by noting that the 6th set in the annual "pioneer art" series was released on 20 February 2013 and depicted the sculptures of Gigmi Kundun. The set of 4, m.s. of 4 different stamps and single stamp miniature sheet show different pieces of work by the artist. The sculptures have fascinating local themes and an intriguing style - I particularly like the bird of paradise on the 8.70 value and the fish on the single value miniature sheet:-

  The Pioneer Art set was designed by Peter Apa and lithographed by Henan Post Printing Factory in Zheng Zhao in China.

  The theme of a set issued on 13 March 2013 is a little more mundane - that of "root crops". The subject does not really allow for particularly glamorous designs but because they illustrate items of local economic importance they inform the collector about life in Papua New Guinea and at least one of the stamps which depicts a large pink vegetable which resembles a pound of liver more than any vegetable I know is weirdly interesting. The issue was designed by Billy John Telek with the printing details being the same as for the Pioneer Arts issue. Once more the set consists of 4 stamps, a m.s. of 4 different designs and a single value miniature sheet:-

234. Lady Thatcher And Sir Rex Hunt.

 Ascension Island, which played an important role as a British military base during the war to liberate The Falkland Islands from military occupation by Argentina, has fittingly become the second territory to announce that it will release a set of stamps to commemorate the late Baroness Thatcher, the first and only woman to become British prime minister and leader at the time of the Falklands war. As we may expect from Pobjoy Stamps and Creative Direction (Worldwide), the philatelic agents and stamp producers for Ascension Island, there are 4 marvelous designs in the set with the 40p depicting Lady Thatcher giving a victory salute, the 50p showing her in the cockpit of a military aircraft (Ascension was an important air force base during the Falklands war), the 60p depicting a wonderful photograph of Lady Thatcher, cup of tea in hand, on a visit to Ascension and the £1.45 value showing her in her Knight of The Garter costume. These designs are a perfect example of how to take an international theme and link it to the territory which is issuing the stamps. The stamps will be issued on 14 June 2013. 

  Meanwhile, the same agency is also releasing 2 further sets with relevance to the Falklands war of 1982. The sets from The Falkland Islands and South Georgia And The South Sandwich Islands commemorate the late Sir Rex Hunt who was Governor of The Falkland Islands from 1980 to 1985 although he was deported from the islands by The Argentinians when they occupied the territory in April 1982. He was born in Redcar in North Yorkshire on 29 June 1926 and joined the Royal Air Force as a cadet in 1941 and became a pilot in 1945. He died on 11 November 2012 and the issue of both sets of stamps will coincide with a memorial service which will be held at St. Clement Danes Central Church of the RAF on 11 June 2013.

I particularly like the 75p value of The Falkland islands set which depicts Sir Rex Hunt in, without wishing to be rude, his vaguely comical full imperial governor's uniform and standing in front of his even more comical official transport in The Falkland Islands, a red London taxi. I guess as a British diplomat, there are a lot of problems to face but none so excruciating as having to wear traditional costumes which date back to Victorian times.

I also illustrate below an exhibition souvenir dating back to 1983, a year after the Falklands war, which reproduced one of the Falkland Islands "liberation" commemorative stamps and in the right hand border, a facsimile signature of Sir Rex Hunt:-

  Mauritius has outlined its new issue programme for 2013 without giving any specific dates of issue apart from the first issue:- 

a. Sites and monuments of Mauritius - 4 stamps (issued 17 April 2013),

b. Anniversaries and events - 4 stamps,

c. Fauna and flora - 3 stamps and

d. Eminent personalities - 2 stamps.

  The latest issues from Hong Kong China are a set of 6 stamps and 1 miniature sheet which includes all 6 values in the Children's stamp series and titled are "My pet and I". The issue was released on 28 March 2013:-

  

and on 7 May 2013 there is an issue which depicts the "Revitalisation of Historic Buildings" and again consists of 6 stamps and 1 miniature sheet:-

The latest issues from Tuvalu are:- 

a. 21 March 2013 - "World Humanitarian Day" - 4 stamps in a sheetlet and 1 single-stamp miniature sheet. No effort has been made by the designer of the stamps to make them relevant to Tuvalu itself, even the map on one of the stamps and in the borders of the m.s. shows The United States and not Tuvalu:-

b. 29 April 2013 - Mushrooms - 4 stamps in a sheetlet and 1 m.s.:-

c. 29 April 2013 - Blossoming plants of the Pacific - 8 stamps (2 sheetlets, each of 4 different stamps) and 2 m.s. These are really quite attractive designs but why not make it an issue of "Blossoming plants of Tuvalu" rather than of the general Pacific area?