On 2nd May 2012, Spink sold “The Adriano Landini Collection of Fine Covers of the World”, including a few covers of interest to the Jubilee collector.
Category Archives: Auction News
British Levant Rarity in Grosvenor sale
The largest known multiple of the 1893 40pa on 1/2d vermilion provisional is up for sale in Grosvenor’s 7th-8th March 2012 sale of British Empire and Foreign Countries. The high opinion of the rarity of this unmounted mint strip of five is underlined by the £10’000-£12’000 estimate. Catalogued by Stanley Gibbons at £425 each, that means they are estimating at well over 4 times catalogue!
Better news for the modest collector though, as there is also a selection of the British Levant Jubilee issue with Specimen and Cancelled handstamps.
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“Chartwell” Jubilees are SPECTACULAR
It was only last November, that the Gold Medal collection of Jubilees by Lady Mary Buiri was sold at Sotheby’s. Now Spink are offering on the 13th October, as part of the “Chartwell” collection, a collection of Jubilees possibly surpassing that of Lady Buiri’s!!
The most striking and desireable of the collection is lot 876 (pictured). A page of handpainted essays of the final design for the entire set on an archive page, and endorsed by the Inland Revenue Secretary and with “THE DESIGNS ARE SIMPLY DRAWN BY HAND AND DO NOT SHOW THE FINISHED EFFECT WHICH WILL BE OBTAINED BY ENGRAVING.” printed below. At £30’000-35’000, it’s no price to be sniffed at, but at £3’000 to £3’500 per essay (excluding commission of course), it is well worth the money, and in my opinion, would be the pinnacle of a Jubilee collection. That gives me 17 days to save up…
The rest of the collection is full of essays, die proofs, colour trials, CANCELLED overprints and so take a look at the catalogue!
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Upcoming Grosvenor sale includes Niger Coast
On September 28th, Grosvenor are having a British Empire sale including some Niger Coast and Boer War items. Of note is lot 1399, an envelope from Niger Coast franked with three 1s green overprinted stamps. The cover was last sold at the John Sacher collection of West Africa only as recently as November 2009 and realised £1’200+20%. The estimate is £2’000-2’500… Also in this section there are a selection of mint and used provisional overprints on the Jubilee issue.
The other item of note is lot 1644, a cover sent during the Boer War, showing violet straight line ”CENSORED G.B. BEAK”, incl. the original letter with the message: ”We were supposed to be creating a diversion whilst Hunter and Clements attacked the Burghers from the north. The diversion part of the scheme appears to have been entirely successful, but as yet we have got no news from Hunter”. The cover (address faded) bears a 1/2d vermilion pair unaccepted firstly at Ficksburg where framed ”TE BETALEN” was applied before entering the military post with F.P.O. cancellations. Unusual.
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Corbitts Sell Sensational Franking on Telegram
Corbitts, situated in Newcastle, sold this sensational telegram for £1’150 plus commission. Sent from Leighlinbridge (Ireland) to Transvaal, it bears no fewer than 56 x 6d, 24 x 9 and 13 x 1s green & carmine, completely covering the reverse side of the form! Although it has some faults, it wasn’t surprising to see this smash the estimate of £650-850. The only dissapointing thing about it was that I wasn’t the winning bidder!
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“Wellington” collection goes by mostly unnoticed
One of the largest collections of Great Britain ever to be sold in one auction went by largely unnoticed in the city of Basel in Switzerland on June 7th and 8th. Although the repercussions of this auction are still being felt throughout the GB philatelic world for all the wrong reasons. Hosted by Galerie Dreyfus, several significant items (and unfortunately several significantly dodgy items) in British philately went up for sale as only 10 or so people filled the room to bid on an estimated €4’000’000 worth of material. This of course made me very optimistic about snapping up some bargains when the few Jubilee issue items came up for sale.
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Grosvenor have rare inverted overprint
Grosvenor had a smaller offering of the Jubilee issue than normal, but they did have two items of note. The first was a 1s green and carmine with inverted “GOVT / PARCELS” overprint, still tied to a small piece of parcel label. Only 12 are known to exist. This example was actually a re-offer from a previous sale, but had its estimate reduced to £3800-4000. However, it still went unsold. Also of interest was a dramatically mis-perfed 2 1/2d purple on blue which fetched £260 plus 20% commission against an estimate of £150-200.
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Gaertner has scarce 1s green and carmine on cover
Christoph Gaertner Philatelie has this 1s green and carmine on cover in their next auction. Not only are these scarce on cover (just over 50 are known), this is possibly a unique usage, as it was sent at the AR (advice of receipt) rate, with two strikes of the “AR” handstamps adjacent. The starting price was €400, but was unsold. Perhaps because the 1s isn’t particularly tied to the cover, but it does seem to be genuine.
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Spink offer strong selection of Boer War
The Spink sale on 12th January 2011 had a strong selection of Boer War material, and with it, a number of fine usages of the 1887 Jubilee issue.
The first interesting item was a strip of six of the Mafeking Siege 1d on 1/2d vermilion, which is one of only two known multiples showing the complete setting. Estimated at £400-500, it sold for £650, and was quickly placed on David Brandon’s website for £1600!
Also from the Mafeking Siege issues was a block of six of the 6d on 2d green and red, which only fetched £500 against an estimate of £600-800. Multiples of these issues are very scarce and I’ve not seen any larger than this one.
Next, was my favourite item from this sale (pictured). A 1/2d vermilion with “ARMY / OFFICIAL” overprint tied to an envelope by a blue “LADYSMITH SIEGE POST OFFICE” datestamp. The Army Official stamps are very scarce on cover anyway, and are much under catalogued by Stanley Gibbons. So it was no suprise to see the estimate of £150-180 get smashed by a realisation of £400. Throughout all the catalogues and literature I have scoured, I have only seen this franking once, in a book about the Boer War. So I was very happy to have snapped this one up!
Unfortunately for me, not all my bids were successful, and a cover bearing five 1/2d vermilions tied by the temporary “VOLKSRUST” cancel in violet escaped me. Although it had some minor faults, the cover fetched £400 against a pre-sale estimate of £250-300.
The last item worthy of note from this Boer War section, was an unusual cover bearing a 3d purple on yellow tied by a Harrismith cds, along with a strip of five Natal 1d stamps cancelled by a manuscript “Harrismith”. Estimated at £150-180, it unsuprisingly fetched £380.
And finally, the last item to peak my interest was a beautifully hand illustrated cover from the famous King Harman correspondence, showing a man riding a horse in front of Gibraltar rock, and bearing five 1/2d vermilions. These covers always command good prices, although they appear on the market relatively frequently. It was sold for £480 against an estimate of £400-500.
Please note that all prices realised are subject to a further 20% commission
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The 1887 Jubilee Issue 