ABOVE: North Borneo 1894 5c black and vermilion, depicting the great argus pheasant
Mention British North Borneo to a Commonwealth collector and a number of responses are possible.
He may be beguiled by some of the most attractive and innovative issues to emerge at the end of the 19th century.
Equally, he may be confused by the seemingly endless array of cancelled-to-order remainders, printer’s waste, improbable perforations, spurious overprints and downright forgeries that exist.
ABOVE: The top value had a magnificent portrait of King George V in the uniform of the Gordon Highlanders
The Falkland Islands had enjoyed its own stamps since the 1870s, but its most memorable set had to wait until 1933, when it marked the Centenary of British Administration in some style, with its first truly pictorial series and its first printed in two colours.
It was early in 1833 that Britain had sent two warships to expel South American insurgents from the islands, and when the 24-year-old Charles Darwin arrived on HMS Beagle that March he was greatly relieved to see the Union flag flying aloft.
But the situation remained tense, and a few months later rebellious gauchos would run amok, slaughtering eight islanders loyal to Britain.
The Nicaraguan Mt Momotombo 5c blue, which helped change the course of the Panama Canal
The first attempt to construct a navigable link between the Caribbean Sea and the Pacific Ocean, by the great French engineer Ferdinand de Lesseps in 1882, was stymied by landslides, malaria and yellow fever.
Together, these caused the deaths of almost 22,000 workers in Panama.
When the United States took up the challenge, its Canal Commission initially recommended a different route, through Nicaragua.
In 1935 France laid down the first of four new Richelieu-class ‘super-dreadnought’ battleships, the most powerful it had ever built, in response to heightened international tension.
By January 1939, when the third vessel was commissioned, war had become a serious possibility and the mood of the nation was in need of a lift.
Jamaica, the largest island in the British West Indies, was the very first British colony to operate its own postal service, having a post office established shortly after it was siezed from the Spanish in the 17th century.
But for two centuries the colony’s governors failed to implement an efficient service.
Did rubber tapping techniques really undergo radical change between 1935 and 1938?
Today more than 70% of natural rubber comes from Indonesia, Malaysia and Thailand.
But in 1935 the British colony of Ceylon was a very important producer, and it was keen to reflect this in its pictorial definitive series of 1935-36.
Four of the 11 values were recess-printed by De La Rue, and the other seven by Bradbury Wilkinson.
1899 Zanzibar 2r depicting Sultan Hamoud bin Mohammed, from the second series recess-printed but with a second colour added by letterpress
The British Empire was always alert to developments in Zanzibar in the 19th century, because of its strategic importance for trade along the east coast of Africa.
Imperial influence was clear from the fact that an Indian post office was opened there in 1868, and the Heligoland-Zanzibar treaty of 1890 formally established a British protectorate over the island.
Initially Indian and later British East African stamps overprinted with the word ‘Zanzibar’ were used.
The Turks & Caicos 2s and 3s
Stamps depicting the seal of a colony seemed to be a favourite recommendation of Colonial Secretaries in the late 19th century.
Instructions to the Crown Agents frequently urged the use of a single design with a central device to convey the badge.
Precisely this approach was suggested for the first combined issue of the Turks & Caicos Islands in 1900, and the result was something of a classic in conveying the economic raison d’être of one of the least heralded corners of the Empire.
St Vincent's first high value
The Caribbean island of St Vincent thrived for many years as a simple plantation economy, but after the emancipation of slave labour in 1833 its development required an efficient postal system.
In 1852 a post office was opened at Kingstown, the capital, where British stamps were used initially, cancelled by the distinctive ‘A10’ oval postmark.
But on June 4, 1860, a Post Office Act paved the way for the colony to issue its own stamps.
