For me the “event” of this month was the arrival of an air freight copy of the new 2019 Stanley Gibbons “Commonwealth & British Empire Stamps 1840-1970” catalogue.  The 121st Edition in fact.  I get a tad jaded with many things in this business, but am NOT jaded about receiving this monster each year! 

This volume is universally known to old-timers and the trade as the “Gibbons Part 1”.  Once, in days of FAR less new issues, the other non-Commonwealth Volumes were numbered sequentially, from 1951 to 1970 they had: “Part 2 - Europe & Colonies” and “Part 3 - America, Asia and Africa”.  Those contained full detail of perfs and watermarks etc.

Later on, the Tsunami of new issues that started in the 1960’s, meant the new issues in one year globally were talking up as many pages as the 50 previous years for some countries, so SG needed to split Volumes 2 and 3 into more logical regional Editions, and later on, limited the content of “Part 1” up to 1970 only.

This huge volume “Commonwealth & British Empire Stamps” is the absolute “Bible” globally for British Commonwealth stamps and cover pricing.  Forget Scott and Michel and Yvert etc - they are basically meaningless for Commonwealth stamps.  No catalogue is perfect, but this comes very close, and the Editors do an outstanding job in my view.

The average collector buys a new major catalogue only once every few years, as they are rather expensive.  For many dealers and collectors, being a few years out of date is no big deal.  THIS is definitely the year to update, if you have not done so for a while!  Lots of big changes and price updates in here.

Printed on a nice crisp fresh white paper stock. Cheery and "alive" compared to my already VERY yellowed early 2000’s SG pages, with sad grey illustrations.  Colour illustrations right through, very many of them on each page.  And many new varieties and listings are added this year.  Over 750 full colour huge pages now.

A nice crisp clean sans serif font has been used for the last few editions, and makes it so much easier to read - see sample page shown nearby.  And in recent editions the country headings are in RED - a very simple thing to do, and they really stand out.  The small things like that were overlooked for years!

Lots of constant plate flaws, and booklets are now listed.  And lots of inverted watermarks - for the UK all inverted and sideways watermarks are now fully listed and priced.  Find just a really medium one from a country like Australia or UK, and the entire book will be readily paid for MANY times!  Often stamps cat 10p each used are cat many £1,000s each with inverted watermark. 

This year the pricing committee have been super active in the Australasia area.  If you only buy a new SG each 5 or 10 years, this is the year to update, as there are extensive upward adjustments.  Some I saw on quick look of 450% increases over last year, so some SERIOUS moves!

There have been exceptional auction realisations for much of this material in the past year, and these price increases are simply taking that pricing reality into account, and moving the SG prices into line with what is occurring in the real world stamp marketplace.

The attractive 2d Sydney View shown nearby, SG #15 is now cat £21,000.  Only a few years back, full SG was way under HALF that at - £8,500, so buying quality always pays off.  And if your SG value says £8,500, you are so out of touch, for your book to be essentially meaningless. 

I do know that as a large dealer WHATEVER I offer lately in attractive nice condition Australia States issues - right from imperfs to the last issues, sell near as fast as loaded up.  They have been under-priced for decades, and if you have any gaps, NOW is the time to fill some spaces as they will never be cheaper.

 The States issues are NOT something to buy as a novice, off cowboy sources like eBay.  They are VERY often wildly misidentified - deliberately, and/or repaired etc.  Cleaned off fiscal cancels are offered with new fake cancels as “FU” etc.  You really are foolish if you buy such material EXCEPT from well-established dealer members of major stamp trade bodies. 

These increases are often very substantial, so any collector or dealer working on older books is costing themselves money.  All the Australia States issues have had extensive re-vamps I noticed, and what follows is a brief summary of what I noted on a fairly quick spot check of this, and the last 2018 edition.

NSW sets the trend with all the early Imperfs, SG 1-43 all up mint about 20% - that is serious money upticks on these already pricey classics.  SG #1 goes from £13,000 to £16,000 etc.  Nice copies fetch terrific money at auction, and are tough to source.

Indeed looking through the new Catalogue, I see near all NSW issues up to 1870 or so, are up in price Mint, and often in used as well.  Certainly worth a careful look.  Even some of the often neglected Postage Dues NSW issues see increases.

Are all NSW imperfs up?  Well no, and there are indeed some “sleepers” lurking among early NSW, I can guarantee you that!  I was this week pricing up a superb and clean and fault free 6d Fawn Diadem, 4 margin SG 111, with error Watermark numeral “8” and not “6” that is shown nearby.

I found it on a stockcard I’d last priced in 1998.  That happens all the time here - a 3 floor house of stamps in long forgotten boxes and filing cabinets etc.  Usually 20 year old cards of Classics are now double or treble the original prices.  Anyway, when I originally priced it, SG was then SG 119a, and listed at £120.

In the new 2019 SG Part One - 21 years on, it is listed used at £110.  Less than in 1998!  So we have a 164 year watermark error Imperforate, in superb 4 margin condition, with no faults, being placed into stock at $A90 - way less than the current PO Year Album.  Madness.  Do SG have one in stock - of course not!  These at £200-250 is more like the correct level.

 Queensland sees the very tough 2d Blue imperf SG 2, up from £16,000/£1,800 to £18,000 mint and £2,000 used.  Again, buy these ONLY from members of leading dealer bodies who offer FIRM guarantees - the spivs on eBay offer perforated 2d Blues with trimmed off perfs, as these rare stamps.  Same colour.

South Australia has the ever popular 1855 1d green SG #1 up 20% mint from £12K from £10K, and up too is the scarce 6d SG 3 imperf, also increasing around 20% to £5,500 from £4,500.  Again the notes above apply - avoid eBay where the conmen offer trimmed off perforated copies regularly on the SA SG 1-3 as “imperfs”.

The SA 1855 1/- Violet imperforate moves up near 50% from £27K to £40K - a heck of a leap in one edition.  Who says there is no money in better stamps!  Solid increases I saw across all areas - even the 1888 “Long Toms” are all up 10% or so, based on strong auction results - the top value £20 is now £42,000 mint.

Tasmania remains ever popular.  The earlies SG 1-18 are all up mint, often by 10% or so. (SG 14 is a typo – “rising” from £10,000 to £1,100!)  Later imperfs are often up nicely - the 1855 6d Imperf is up 25% mint to £1,500 for instance.  Be SUPER careful about “Mint” of those on eBay that have had fiscal pen cancels bleached off.

For VICTORIA all the “Half Lengths” seem to get increases in mint, SG #1 going from £32K to £35K.  The Imperforate “Queen On Throne” issues are often up 25% in mint.  Again all due to strong auction results in the past year, setting new price records for these sought after issues.

Victoria 1886 “Pastel Long Toms” are up a lot mint – the £6 SG 325, up 25% to £15,000.  Again due to the mad prices paid at the Corinphila “Besancon” auction. This example shown nearby was estimated at just 2000 Francs and was invoiced at the time, for FULL then SG, $A22,500 - despite being described as: “.. mark removed from face of stamp, diagonal crease .. and regummed”

Indeed all 4 of these pretty “Pastel” bi-colour stamps were offered - all regummed, and all sold for the same price - for about $A90,000 the quartet.  Rod Perry sold them to him for $A9,000 all with no gum, so 10 times profit is never bad on that kind of large outlay.  The new SG price as can be seen, is not much more than this creased, fiddled with and regummed copy fetched. 

 Western Australia powers on strongly of course.  The SG #1, “1d Black Swan” is up both mint and used to £1,500/£300.  Always a popular Bird item.  The 4d “Inverted Frame” is of course up strongly from £140K to £180K.  Sound high?  Well nowhere near as high as it SHOULD be of course.  The example shown nearby sold for $A425,000 mid 2018 at Corinphila.

That 1854 4d “Inverted Frame” has a bad 3mm paper slit above “OU”, and a vertical crease.  I suspect the SG prices had been set before that sale took place, as even full new cat £180,000 is miles under what this defective example shown nearby sold for at Public Auction.

Western Australia sees price increases right into the 1900s.  A very popular State, and strong global demand - especially among “Bird” thematic collectors, as most issues depict - BIRDS!  Don’t laugh - near all the available 4d Swan “Inverted Frames” (worth millions) are owned by Dr. Arthur Woo - who has a serious BIRDS ON STAMPS collection!

Only 14 genuine “Inverted Frame” examples are recognised, and exactly HALF of those, or 7 copies, are in Museum or Royal or Institutional collections, and are thus not buyable by modern collectors, and never will be I am sure.  The two fakes previously regarded as genuine, Dr Woo also owns.  Photos of all 16 here - tinyurl.com/FakeSwan 

Hong Kong Doctor, Arthur Woo owns near all the others - I have seen them exhibited all on one page - and he may well have been the buyer of the example auctioned mid year in Switzerland.  The buyer has not yet been disclosed, and/or made himself known. It was invoiced for 314,600 Swiss Francs, or near exactly $A425,000 at the time.

Lots of price increases noted in AUSTRALIA.  Many of the major printing errors and inverted watermarks are up strongly.  The 4d Violet KGV “Line Through Four Pence” is up to £34K and £9K.  The last used one I sold years back went for a tiny fraction of that, so these have performed very well, and are not often seen offered.

Some more modest and affordable plate errors like the 1929 3d green Airmail “Long Wing To Plane” I suggested last edition should be added, is up 10% to £300 and £180 used.  A very easy to spot error, and almost no-one overseas knows it exists, so you might pick one up for a dollar or so in dealer stock, or on first flight covers where many of them were used.

As usual SG cleverly adds a new plate flaw or two for folks to chase.  This year I note the appearance of the “Falling Mailbag” variety on the 1931 3d Blue Kingsford Smith.  SG 122a sees it debut in listing at £120 mint and £100 used.  Why the names of errors when newly added, do not coincide with the 50 year usage here of “Plane Dropping Mailbag” mystifies me.

Later issued varieties like the 1941 1/- Lyrebird “Roller Flaw” SG 192a is up in value 20% mint or used.  All the other KGVI era “Roller Flaws” also increase in price.  The 2d red KGVI “Medal Flaw” shown nearby is £350/£130, and are worth only pennies with no flaw.  Fill those gaps soon, as these errors are not getting any more common!

Did you know the “Top Hat” flaw on the 6d Kookaburra is now cat £1,500 mint - up from £550 only 4 years before?  A scarce and very popular flaw, and very seldom offered, so leaps up EVERY year.  Buy off someone foolishly using a couple of years old Catalogue to “save money”, and YOU win by £950!

Were you aware that a ½d Orange Kangaroo Coil Block of 4 is now Cat in SG at £1,000 mint?  Or the “Green Mist Retouch” on the 1/- Lyrebird SG 230da is £4,500 mint and £3,250 used etc. “Knowledge Is Power” - as I have probably typed here 1,000 times!

Did you know the 1941 1/- Lyrebird, also with inverted watermark SG 192w is Cat £6,000 mint or used - but just 10p in normal used etc?  This is up by £1,000 mint and £2,000 used over last edition.  And the exact same massive increases occurred last year too!  Check your duplicates.  Many are still out there to be found.

EASY to see plate varieties are great to see included.  Super specialised catalogues like the ACSC, by their very nature, are filled with 100s of pages of near impossible to see at normal size “Fly Specks” that totally do my head in - and they do my eyes in, that is for SURE!

Stanley Gibbons have the luxury of only listing major retouches or flaws that are very easy to spot with the naked eye.  One I suggested added for the next edition, is the 1960 8d Tiger Cat “Typhoon Retouch”.  A scarce error, as it was not noticed by collectors for a couple of years after stamp was withdrawn, so in mint positional blocks are really tough.

A client has matched top right corner blocks 6 showing all of the 4 stages of this amazing and clumsy retouch - the most dramatic ever on Australia recess printed stamps - I took this scan nearby from his block.  I keep trying to swap them with him for a Roo he needs, as they would be near unique in matched mint blocks!

Price rises are even seen in the Postage Dues issues - the scarce 1908 20/- “with stroke” is up to £7,500 mint and £40,000 used, but a warning, read the SG and ACSC notes.  These were ONLY issued in NSW so the fake “Vic. Aust” cancels applied by a Melbourne dealer to toned mint stamps etc, are forgeries made to deceive.

Perforated “OS” Australia very often see increases.  The usual warning on these too, buy the scarcer ones ONLY from experienced and reputable dealers.  Near all on eBay are modern fakes cranked out by the 1,000s, as the Bunnies cannot tell, and cannot resist a ”BAAAHRGIN” - which they will regret when they sell!

In a quick perusal of the PAPUA listings I noticed some upward price tinkering, and a “HALO” flaw has now been added to the common 1d green, 1937 KGVI Coronation.  It is SG 154a, cat £40 and £50 used.  You might pick these up for 10¢ each in the club circuit books or dealer stocks! 

The Papua “OS” official overprints appear to be up right across the board. They are NOT easy to source in complete sets, and I’d suggest you ONLY buy them thus, as chasing about for 3 or 4 missing middle values may well take you the rest of your lifetime, and odd singles are seldom offered.

Indeed some KGVI watermark varieties are double or treble the last year’s edition.  Notably the 1/3d KGVI, SG 687aw goes from £10 to £45.  That is a 4½ times increase in one year!  The 2/- KGVI value nearly trebles over last year’s price.  None of these are easy to find, and the global collecting interest in watermark errors is driving prices. 

New Zealand also sees many good increases in the “Officials” and Postage Dues.  There are some strong rises among the popular Postal Fiscal stamps - both the Queen Victoria and the Arms series.  In both mint and used.  Interest in these stamps is growing all the time, and dealer stock is near non-existent globally for most of them.

Collectors are famously tight fisted with buying catalogues, but a strong and profitable SG catalogue division is ESSENTIAL for a robust and healthy world stamp market.  Many totally forget that, so do your bit, and add to their sales volume.  I have sold plenty of these new “1840-1970” this month to assist - offering heavily subsided global post costs to assist buyers!

If all collectors (and clubs) who actively collect British Commonwealth all went out and bought this new catalogue today, that is a million quid injection into SG right there.  A small cost to each collector/club for a very useful book, but a big injection to SG finances, at a crucial time.

Stanley Gibbons are not a Charity or Government Department, but a publicly listed business, and must make a profit.  Falling sales of these works may well see the new bean counters in place at SG decide to not print catalogues at all.  Simple as that.  And in my experience, such moves are instant, AND final, so there is no good lamenting it all after the event.

SG have sacked their previous incompetent CEO Michael Hall, who near sent the company broke in recent years with his wacky ideas, and stupid and disastrous acquisitions, £10 million web follies, and Portfolio selling, and are now back to basics, where they were 15 years ago - selling top quality stamps and publications.

A great effort from editor Hugh Jefferies MBE, and his Catalogue team - how they get the vast swag of SG Catalogues out each year, sure beats me!  A never ending process, and juggling, logging, and tracking all the New Issues, and new flaws and ever changing prices etc, must be an absolute nightmare.

DO secure one -  a strong SG Catalogue division is essential for the ongoing health of this hobby, and with SG’s recent fiscal problems, they truly need support.  Many collectors have VERY narrow or non-existent “Big Picture” vision sadly - and I can only repeat - DO support these fine works - without them each year, the hobby would be in a terrible mess. 

$100 or so a year, now and again, to support the Catalogue division, is a drop in the pond to what most cheerfully spend on their stamps a year.  And a drop in the Ocean as to how the value of your stamps will DROP in an era of no new catalogues.  As the famous song said -

An often overlooked stamp subject is the unpopular-to-this-day monarch, King Edward VIII - centre of the American Wallace Simson scandal.  If Edward had married Wallis Simpson, a divorcee who would soon have two living ex-husbands, it would have conflicted with his ex officio role as Supreme Governor of the Church of England.

The fancy Intaglio raised print autographed card shown nearby, I sold in recent years, and is from after the infamous KEVIII Royal abdication - it is signed by "Edward Duke Of Windsor" and the term Mrs Wallis Simpson later adopted - "Wallis Windsor."  KGVI refused to allow her to be called “Her Royal Highness”.

For anyone looking for a challenging and quite inexpensive new collecting field, the stamps depicting King Edward VIII are a perfect field. They were issued in England in September 1936, and he abdicated his right to ascend the British Throne in December that year!

The ONLY stamps issued anywhere in the entire British Commonwealth were the 4 different denomination stamps from GB shown nearby issued early September 1936 - and some of those, as collectors realise, were also overprinted for Morocco Agencies etc.

None of these are expensive as mint stamps, and for the UK issues at least, they were pretty widely used on covers, so a decent "usage" collection on covers or parcels pierces, can be assembled with time, and persistence, and at VERY little real expense.

The UK KEVIII quartet as illustrated nearby is SG 457/460, and is full cat in SG at £1.25 for mint unhinged, for the complete set of 4!   Remarkably cheap for a stamp issue over 80 years old.  I suspect assembling 100 x fresh MUH sets would be a ton harder than you might imagine for such a low rated set!

One cover from September 1937 is shown nearby with the New King’s ½d stamp - KGVI, the abdicated King, ½d KEVII stamp, and their father King George V’s ½d stamp, who died in 1935.  Britain essentially had Three Monarchs over 18 months.  Some UK post offices had stock of all 3 reigns stamps at the same time, it is said.

The cover illustrated nearby is a first flight cover to Port Moresby Papua, and is probably unique with this franking.  In superb condition it quickly sold for just $A60 on stampboards.  So as can be seen, a solid collection of KEVIII stamps, even on very interesting mailed covers, is not very expensive. 

I listed up and quickly sold a KEVIII stamp booklet on stampboards recently for $A65 and these short lived booklets as you can see had 3 of the values in there, in varying quantities. Over 80 years old now, the prices are most affordable I’d suggest if you see any.

As can be seen from the detailed photo nearby, these often had attached stamp size "Tabs" with advertisements on them, and MANY different ads exist, so make for a fascinating field.  The stamps also come with many margin plate numbers, and they too are a fertile specialist field and sell very cheaply.

All the booklet panes also came with Inverted Watermark, and the set also can be found overprinted "Specimen" and a few other printing varieties, so quite a nice collection can be formed, and offers a nice challenge!  SG lists and process them all in the Three Kings catalogue and the panes and inverts are in all standard SG cats.

Britain was the only country to actually issue stamps, but Australia was JUST about to issue one.  A single of that Australia 2d Red KEVIII stamp was auctioned by Phoenix Auctions in Melbourne on July 17, 2014.  It was from a corner block 6 that was essentially “stolen” by a State Governor!  

That KEVIII 2d stamp shown nearby set a world record price for a single stamp from the Commonwealth of Australia.  Historically low interest rates here, overheated real estate and stock markets, and a weak dollar, have seen better top end stamps moving out of dealer hands faster than they can buy them in lately.

At $145,000 plus 19.25% "fees" it cost someone $A172,912.50 on invoice.  The most valuable SINGLE stamp even sold from the Commonwealth of Australia I have determined, after some checking around.  (Memo to those reading this - never use SCISSORS to separate rare stamp blocks, as some goose clearly did here down the left side in 1938!)

The block of 6 stamps appeared first on the stamp market in October 2014 in London, with the sale of the impressive “Vestey Collection” of Australian stamps by Spink, and garnered a then world record price for any Australian stamp piece.  

To this day I understand nothing of this stamp issue remains in the Australia Post Archive collection.  No stamps, and no proofs.  And even stranger, NOTHING from this issue resides in the Royal Collection of Her Majesty The Queen.  Indeed, for 60 years the very existence of this 2d KEVIII block 6 was totally unknown.

The person to whom then State of Victoria Governor Huntingfield mailed the 6 mint Australia 2d KEVIII stamps to in 1936, is known to us now as none other than Sam Vestey's great-grandfather, Sir William Vestey - the First Baron Vestey.

History tells us that King Edward VIII abdicated only days before this new 2d red Australian stamp issue was to be released nationally here.  It was already printed in the millions, and was ready to sell.  Only the UK ever issued stamps depicting this Royal successor to King George V.

At his home castle Fort Belvedere on 10 December 1936, Edward signed his written Abdication notices, witnessed by his three younger brothers: Prince Albert, Duke of York (who succeeded Edward as George VI), Prince Henry, Duke of Gloucester, and Prince George, Duke of Kent. The following day, it was given legislative assent by special Act of The British Parliament: "His Majesty's Declaration of Abdication Act 1936".

A little known fact is that Edward's abdication required the consent of each Commonwealth Dominion, which was duly given.  By the Parliament of Australia, which was at the time in session, and by the Governments of the other Dominions, whose Parliaments were in recess.

Upon this Abdication Act of December 11 1936 passing in the UK, The Australian Post Office was caught on the hop, as many millions of these 2d red KEVIII letter rate definitive stamps had been printed, starting in late September, and were just about to be issued nationally to all Post Offices.

Memos flew around everywhere here, and the frantic edict went out that EVERYTHING connected to these stamps was to be totally destroyed "by smelting or burning".  Plates, artwork, proofs and all stamps etc.  All this to be done under the supervision and signed certificate of the Auditor General of the Commonwealth of Australia - very heavy duty high level supervision.

Government printer John Ash frantically wrote again to the Victoria Governor’s Private secretary December 16, urgently asking that the freebie sheet of stamps he was given be returned immediately, so they could be all completely destroyed, to comply with this new panic stations order.

The Australian Government at high level demanded the printer destroy all copies, proofs and plates of this stamp after the abdication, but clearly Governor Huntingfield did not try very hard (if at all) to obtain the stamps back he had already mailed to his chum in the UK.

The block of 6 fetched about half what some VERY experienced observers had predicted, but still was invoiced for £260,000 - around $A500,000 at that time, as the dollar had sunk badly.  And the dollar has sunk a great deal more since then!

Many might not realise that when the Queen Mother died, hitherto secret documents about the abdication were released, which shows the Queen Mother (KGVI's wife) and Queen Mary – the mother of both men, really hated the American, Wallis Simpson.

In a now public 1938 letter from the new King George VI, to Prime Minister Chamberlain, regarding proposals for his brother to visit Britain, King George wrote: "I think you know that neither the Queen or Queen Mary have any desire to meet the Duchess of Windsor."

The internal Royal Family split was so final, that George could not even bring himself to reveal the reality to Edward.  KGVI told Chamberlain in the newly released letters: "Perhaps my brother would take this decision in a more friendly manner from you, than me?"

The bizarre Wallis Simpson/KEVIII story seems to endlessly fascinate stamp collectors.  In September a link to that discussion and love letters and covers etc, was used on the weekly feed - facebook.com/stampboards

And this resulted in 1531 views - and 28 likes as you can readily as you can readily see, an all-time record by quite a large margin in our several year history - no idea why.   Take a look and please add a “like” when in there - it must be the most visited stamp related facebook page globally, that Margo keeps updated.

tinyurl.com/WallisS contains heaps more discussion on the KEVIII stamp issues, and this unfolding scandal as it occurred, and shows many mailed covers etc, many of which are very interesting, and none of them are expensive at all to buy.