Post by chrischross on Jul 9, 2022 3:19:40 GMT
I've caught the fever for early Gabon again. It's not a fever that's easily dealt with either, with one of the only coping mechanisms researching the original "arrêtés" (orders? colonial orders? Folks fluent in French please weigh in, as Google Translates to "arrested") from the time period.
In the Journal oficiel du Gabon-Congo dated March 16, 1889, the Gabon colonial administrators ordered the surcharges due to insufficient availability of 15c and 25c stamps, a not uncommon problem for early Gabon. The solution the administrators came up with was to take a shipment of 10c stamps and surcharge with 15c (YT 9) and 25c (YT 10):
Two things stand out:
1. "BALLAY", who is of course the same colonial governor depicted in the high values of the later "Palm Series" from the French West African region (Senegal, Ivory Coast, Dahomey, Guinee, Mauritania, Upper Senegal and Niger).
2. That's issuance of 800 and 400 stamps respectively, and the stamps are priced accordingly. Here's an example #9 Alphée Dubois (not mine):
Not the prettiest stamp to be sure, but RRR+ as they say. I ran this through the nifty Postmark-Reveal process and believe the date stamp is ??-June-1889.
I'll post more on the Journal oficiel du Gabon-Congo, as IMO it is essential knowledge for collecting this area. The added benefit here is I don't have to go into bankruptcy proceedings and actually own the physical copies.
In the Journal oficiel du Gabon-Congo dated March 16, 1889, the Gabon colonial administrators ordered the surcharges due to insufficient availability of 15c and 25c stamps, a not uncommon problem for early Gabon. The solution the administrators came up with was to take a shipment of 10c stamps and surcharge with 15c (YT 9) and 25c (YT 10):
Two things stand out:
1. "BALLAY", who is of course the same colonial governor depicted in the high values of the later "Palm Series" from the French West African region (Senegal, Ivory Coast, Dahomey, Guinee, Mauritania, Upper Senegal and Niger).
2. That's issuance of 800 and 400 stamps respectively, and the stamps are priced accordingly. Here's an example #9 Alphée Dubois (not mine):
Not the prettiest stamp to be sure, but RRR+ as they say. I ran this through the nifty Postmark-Reveal process and believe the date stamp is ??-June-1889.
I'll post more on the Journal oficiel du Gabon-Congo, as IMO it is essential knowledge for collecting this area. The added benefit here is I don't have to go into bankruptcy proceedings and actually own the physical copies.
