Lot 1263
1854 (16 Nov) entire letter from Penang...
Stamps and Postal History of the World | 5919
Auction: 6 October 2020 at 01:00 BST
£45,000
Description
1854 (16 Nov) entire letter from Penang to Mauritius, endorsed 'Via Galle p. P&O Steamer', franked by India 1854-55 1a red Die I block of eight ('A' stone, pos. 61-64/69-72) and 1854 2a green block of four and left marginal horizontal pair, (all but the upper right 2a in the block remarkably having four large margins), uncancelled, with red boxed 'PENANG / 18 November / Post Paid' (Proud type P.S.7) and oval 'PACKET LETTER / MAURITIUS' 'DE 20 1854' arrival ds. Carried aboard the P&O steamer S.V. Malta, whose departure from Singapore with ‘Homeward mails’ was advertised in the Straits Times on 14/11/54, where it departed on the 19th, leaving the port of Penang on the 21st.
The blocks on the reverse of the cover are uncancelled (but for ink spots on the 1a)- though the rating mark in red crayon ties the pair on face which has split the paper in the left margin. The unique and spectacular franking of 20 annas accounted for the extra weight which is known to have been carried inside the wrapper, as the letter finishes with a note detailing: “We enclose two letters to Messrs Scott + Co Port Louis, having reference to Captain Panto(?)’s draft on them of £400, which please hand to them”.
A philatelic treasure of extraordinary visual appeal and of the highest importance, being the joint earliest stamped cover from Penang, mailed a mere four weeks after stamps had arrived in the country. SG 12, 31
Provenance
This cover can be traced back to the time of its original receipt. It was almost certainly received by John Gilmer (1821-1897), who sailed to Mauritius in 1842 to operate a Sugar Plantation called “Deux Bras”, near Rose-Belle on the South East of the island. The Gilmer family had close professional and marital links to the Richardsons, International sugar merchants and traders based in Scotland, who are the addressees of the cover.
John Gilmer’s nephew Arthur Dron Gilmer (b.1853) sailed for Mauritius in 1880, where he managed the Deux Bras plantation for 9 years, before returning to Scotland in 1889, where he started his own confectionery business, before emigrating to Canada in 1925. The cover has remained in the possession of his descendants in Canada ever since, nestled safely in the family archive, and as a result has never been offered on the open market.
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