Exciting find of Victoria "Stamp Duty" series MINT to £100!

smithrhm97 · Post by **smithrhm97** » 28 Jan 2015 01:35

As a philatelist at an auction house, it's very rare that I get excited about an email asking "are my stamps are valuable?".

999 times out of a thousand I have to reply to politely tell them that there is no value at all in what they have.

However for the first time in nearly 6 years we've received an enquiry that I'm truly excited about. Now we have them in the office I can share my excitement!

We have had consigned to us the stamps below; the Victoria "Stamp Duty" issues up to the £100 in mint condition.

I know very few of the high values exist unused and I haven't even been able to find any that have sold publicly.

All I know is what I have read from the important reference book "The Stamps of Victoria" by Geoff Kellow. For example, who knew there was 16 printings of the £100 in lithographed, recessed and surface printed?! I've got my work cut out...

aethelwulf · Post by **aethelwulf** » 28 Jan 2015 04:03

Great find. 8) If they've been sitting in Europe all this time, condition is probably pretty good?

smithrhm97 wrote:there was 16 printings of the £100

Why so many printings for such a high value?

thecloudwatcher · Post by **thecloudwatcher** » 28 Jan 2015 06:47

They look so fresh, like they were purchased yesterday. What a priviledge to view them in person

The thought of somebody spending well over £200 on stamps in the late 1800s/early 1900s is mind-boggling - even a complete sheet of the GB 1882 £5 orange (which is a near contemporary to these stamps) would only have cost £140 at face value!!

Philexx · Post by **Philexx** » 28 Jan 2015 07:09

They do look very nice and fresh. Must be nice to come across something like that.

danski99 · Post by **danski99** » 28 Jan 2015 10:30

Incredibly beautiful looking stamps!

Global Administrator · Post by **Global Administrator** » 28 Jan 2015 11:37

smithrhm97 wrote:
All I know is what I have read from the important reference book "The Stamps of Victoria" by Geoff Kellow. For example, who knew there was 16 printings of the £100 in lithographed, recessed and surface printed?! I've got my work cut out...

Wonderful new find Ricky.

Yes that wonderful book is a 'must have' for your work in describing these, and Kellow has them listed in quite some detail, each printing, and numbers done in most cases.

Kellow's brilliant hard cover book I still sell quite a few of each year -

https://www.stampboards.com/viewtopic.php?f=27&t=32599

And that of course drew heavily on Rod Perry's Large Gold Medal collection of Victoria, and Rod is a active member here, and doubtless will add some more info on these. Even he did not have some of these mint.

The 3 high values were each printed singly, in "mini sheets" with margins all around, as can be seen in your photos.

I've seen a mint trio £100 offered recently as I recall, but cannot recall the beautiful "Pastel" set of 5 'Long Toms' being offered Mint at one time. One generally sees them offered CTO (and even so they are $1000 or so a set now) or "Specimen".

Oddly, SG dropped listing the mint vales of those quite recently.

ChrisGray · Post by **ChrisGray** » 28 Jan 2015 12:13

Very nice set.

As a layman I have no idea, why do the high values have selvedge? Were they not printed in sheets?

Global Administrator · Post by **Global Administrator** » 28 Jan 2015 12:20

ChrisGray wrote:
As a layman I have no idea, why do the high values have selvedge? Were they not printed in sheets?

Global Administrator wrote:
The 3 high values were each printed singly, in "mini sheets" with margins all around, as can be seen in your photos.

Global Administrator · Post by **Global Administrator** » 28 Jan 2015 12:31

Ricky .. this is the Recess printed trio I mentioned was offered here recently - August 2014. All unused with a high estimate, they were unsold. Each had 2 Certificates.

ANY of them genuine unused are rare of course. Even fiscal used they fetch many $100s each.

dukeprince · Post by **dukeprince** » 28 Jan 2015 12:49

smithrhm97 wrote:As a philatelist at an auction house, it's very rare that I get excited about an email asking "are my stamps are valuable?".

999 times out of a thousand I have to reply to politely tell them that there is no value at all in what they have.

However for the first time in nearly 6 years we've received an enquiry that I'm truly excited about. Now we have them in the office I can share my excitement!

We have had consigned to us the stamps below; the Victoria "Stamp Duty" issues up to the £100 in mint condition.

I know very few of the high values exist unused and I haven't even been able to find any that have sold publicly.

All I know is what I have read from the important reference book "The Stamps of Victoria" by Geoff Kellow. For example, who knew there was 16 printings of the £100 in lithographed, recessed and surface printed?! I've got my work cut out...

All I can say is I wonder how much I can sell my House for.

These are from a time when Artistisans made Stamps not assorted random Pimply Youths with computors.

aethelwulf · Post by **aethelwulf** » 28 Jan 2015 14:04

dukeprince wrote: These are from a time when Artistisans made Stamps not assorted random Pimply Youths with computors.

Allanswood is darned good at doing mock-up designs of stamps...he often posts his creations on threads. I don't think he's a pimply youth.

fromdownunder · Post by **fromdownunder** » 28 Jan 2015 14:26

I don't usually comment just for the sake of commenting, but these look amazing. I wonder what I can sell my ex-wife's house for?

Norm

traralgon3844 · Post by **traralgon3844** » 28 Jan 2015 16:55

Truly an amazing find. What I find extraordinary is that someone could afford to put away a fantastic amount of money in just the trio of top values. To put it into perspective it is like someone putting away 87 £2 First Watermark Kangaroos, let alone the remaining stamps.

Are they affixed to the backing paper or hinged? Is there anything on the other side of the paper to give a clue to an origin. I was thinking some sort of presentation set, but the positioning of the £10 makes that unlikely.

Any chance of 600 dpi scans of the individual stamps?

smithrhm97 · Post by **smithrhm97** » 28 Jan 2015 19:31

Global Administrator wrote:
Ricky .. this is the Recess printed trio I mentioned was offered here recently - August 2014. All unused with a high estimate, they were unsold. Each had 2 Certificates.

ANY of them genuine unused are incredibly rare of course.

http://www.stampboards.com/images/prestigephilately/catlot.p ... vic&lim=40

Thank you for this Glen.

Once we've described them and scanned them we'll get the better ones sent off for a BPA certificate.

They were hinged to what is best described as the interleaving in old stamp albums by old paper hinges. So they've obviously been tucked away for a long time. Some were slightly stuck to the paper and the gum a little toned but apart from the £10 which has a little toning they all look great.

The £25, £50 and £100 we have are all recess-printed too by the way

Rod Perry · Post by **Rod Perry** » 28 Jan 2015 21:06

The three uber high denominations are amongst the world's rarest of their type, much more so than the KUT £100 for example.

Stanley Gibbons purchased from the Victoria Post Office just five of the £100 (which they sold to well-heeled New issue clients for £105, probably Sterling).

J.R.W. Purves informed me that all were accounted for; Peter Jaffe's example with full margins was the Breitfuss new issue.

Other buyers included the Royal family, Ferrary and the American, Ayers.

Purves could account for the Ferrary set of Postal fiscals to £100, for it was he as a youthful entrant to the family's Purves & Purves legal firm who bought them at a Ferrary sale in the early 1920s, for considerably under face value.

The firm used the highest denomination stamps at full face on transfer of land title documents (the principal use for these stamps), and relished in being the "smartest young man in the firm for some time thereafter", as Purves once put it.

I suspect that this new find was not purchased as New issues from a source other than S.G.; the mounting arrangement is too haphazard for such incredibly expensive contemporaneous stamps.

Rather, it is more likely they were a perhaps one-off presentation to a super V.I.P., perhaps of English origin (my guess The Right Honourable John Adrian Louis Hope, the Earl of Hopetoun GCMG, Governor of Victoria, 1889-95), which might explain why they have turned up in Europe.

By the way, the origin whatever it may be does not tarnish in any form the desirability of what are obviously genuine mint stamps!

Were I still collecting Victoria, I would be the man to beat at the upcoming auction.

Rod

wolseley16/60 · Post by **wolseley16/60** » 29 Jan 2015 17:19

An extremely rare assemblage..... my rough stab at C.V. value is $170,000 !!!

jjarmstrong47 · Post by **jjarmstrong47** » 29 Jan 2015 18:22

What I think is really amazing is that the current owner seems to have had no idea that they were valuable.

The person who bought them in to us was probably too scared to tell his wife what he paid for them.

It would be fascinating to know where they have been all this time.

Philexx · Post by **Philexx** » 29 Jan 2015 19:13

If these will be up for viewing in Geneva at some point I might nip over to have a look as they are in such superb condition. Always wanted to see Geneva anyway

Global Administrator · Post by **Global Administrator** » 05 Mar 2015 21:32

Ricardo ... what date auction will these be in?

Glen

smithrhm97 · Post by **smithrhm97** » 06 Mar 2015 01:37

They will be offered in our June 1st to 6th auction series (not sure which specific date yet)

pomerol · Post by **pomerol** » 06 Mar 2015 03:08

Quite the find! I think the "Stamp Duty" series are some of the best Victoria stamps. Were there later official reprints of the £25, £50 and £100 stamps?

Global Administrator · Post by **Global Administrator** » 06 Mar 2015 03:20

pomerol wrote:
Were there later official reprints of the £25, £50 and £100 stamps?

There were many printings of these, all outlined in detail in Kellow Book above, but all primarily for revenue purposes basically.

They were variously Lithographed, Recess Printed (the ones I show below which are the "brightest" colours, and best printed) and surface printed, and all come in a WIDE range of shades from rather pale to very deep.

Fiscal used are known of course, but even so get VERY strong prices as they are not common at all.

The CTO sets are pretty - I sold this one recently.

Glen

passport_collect · Post by **passport_collect** » 06 Mar 2015 10:26

Nice, but surely the GB Machin series is the peak of stamp design?

Robert1 · Post by **Robert1** » 06 Mar 2015 12:46

Global Administrator wrote:
pomerol wrote:
Were there later official reprints of the £25, £50 and £100 stamps?
There were many printings of these, all outlined in detail in Kellow Book above, but all primarily for revenue purposes basically.

Fiscal used are not uncommon, but even so get VERY strong prices as they are not common at all.

The CTO sets are pretty - I sold this one recently.

Glen

Glen,

They surely are beautiful.

What would that trio set a buyer back today? - even a ball park number?

Global Administrator · Post by **Global Administrator** » 06 Mar 2015 13:03

Robert the CTO's are priced in Gibbons. SG 289/291 Cat £1,800 = $A3,600 as CTO. No Postally used exist of any value, although they were fully valid for postage until mid-1901, under the Commonwealth arrangements, hence the full SG listing.

So these are the only practical way for anyone to secure this trio. If folks collect by SG they MUST have these. I sold them for less than half Gibbons at $1650, but stress the condition was WAY above most around.

Clean and fresh, and free of the usual thins and creases and foxing and many missing perfs these massive stamps generally attract. Matched Melbourne CTO cancels - “Melbourne Nov 20 – 1900.” Hard to improve on in appearance, priced at what a MUH 5/- Harbour Bridge costs today.

In 10 years they will be worth about double what a MUH 5/- Bridge sells for.

Glen

Robert1 · Post by **Robert1** » 06 Mar 2015 13:38

Global Administrator wrote:Robert the CTO's are priced in Gibbons. SG 289/291 Cat £1,800 = $A3,600 as CTO. No Postally used exist of any value, although they were fully valid for postage until mid-1901, under the Commonwealth arrangements, hence the full SG listing.

So these are the only practical way for anyone to secure this trio. If folks collect by SG they MUST have these. I sold them for less than half Gibbons at $1650, but stress the condition was WAY above most around.

Clean and fresh, and free of the usual thins and creases and foxing and many missing perfs these massive stamps generally attract. Matched Melbourne CTO cancels - “Melbourne Nov 20 – 1900.” Hard to improve on in appearance, priced at what a MUH 5/- Harbour Bridge costs today.

In 10 years they will be worth about double what a MUH 5/- Bridge sells for.

Glen

Thanks Glen

Not as much as I perhaps thought, that seems great value. Most important I think is the fact they are "Matched Melbourne CTO cancels" - this surely, in my opinion, improves the trio !

thecloudwatcher · Post by **thecloudwatcher** » 06 Mar 2015 20:07

Robert1 wrote:Most important I think is the fact they are "Matched Melbourne CTO cancels" - this surely, in my opinion, improves the trio !

Agreed.

Global Administrator · Post by **Global Administrator** » 06 Mar 2015 20:28

Robert1 wrote:
Most important I think is the fact they are "Matched Melbourne CTO cancels" - this surely, in my opinion, improves the trio !

That is a huge plus actually.

The recent McCready catalogue on the Victoria CTO's records very MANY dates that are recorded on these 3.

To get all 3 matching is not often seen. Indeed these stamps are very often sold singly, due to their value.

Global Administrator · Post by **Global Administrator** » 06 Mar 2015 20:34

I sold this one, and it remains one of the great mysteries of the series.

It is tied by 'December 00' cds to a piece of thick, linen backed paper as used for bank mailings of heavy parcels etc. Had a clear Photo Certificate.

WHY no-one knows. Even the cds are applied at greatly different angles as can be seen. Kellow had never seen it before or anything like it, and Rod may like to add his thoughts.

CTOs were sold to the public with full gum, and the MP presented ones were affixed lightly to a paper sheet with the cancel PRE-applied, not tied to the backing paper like this, ever.

£50 was 6 months wages for a working man back then!

Whatever I sold it for I'd pay TWICE that now to get it back.

gugusg · Post by **gugusg** » 06 Mar 2015 21:34

Haha, funny, this is french inside the stamp : "Honni soit qui mal y pense", from "ordre de la jarretière" it seems (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Order_of_the_Garter)

Robert1 · Post by **Robert1** » 07 Mar 2015 02:04

gugusg wrote:Haha, funny, this is french inside the stamp : "Honni soit qui mal y pense", from "ordre de la jarretière" it seems (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Order_of_the_Garter)

French indeed, translates to -

Shame be to him who thinks evil of it.

The other accepted translation is -

May he be shamed who thinks badly of it.

smithrhm97 · Post by **smithrhm97** » 07 Mar 2015 03:14

Some better images...

aethelwulf · Post by **aethelwulf** » 07 Mar 2015 04:53

The top value is missing a corner of selvedge...I'll pass on bidding.

smithrhm97 · Post by **smithrhm97** » 22 Jun 2015 22:45

In case anyone is interested, they will be auctioned this Wednesday.

We got good Royal Philatelic Society of London certificates for the £25, £50 and £100.

You can see all the stamps with the descriptions and estimates here:

http://www.davidfeldman.com/auctions/browse-lots/aucP/192-20 ... l/all/all/

jjarmstrong47 · Post by **jjarmstrong47** » 23 Jun 2015 10:15

Ricky and David Feldman SA have been very supportive of my efforts to record the early engravers in a database form. These are superb examples of the engraver's skill. They were engraved by C. Jackson who ran a private engraving business at 79 Queens Street in Melbourne from 1863 - 1868 and seems to have moved to government employ after that as these were done in the 1880s.

The National Gallery in Victoria has very few details of his work and no examples to view, which is a shame for such a talented early artist.

He also is listed as one of the designers, along with L. Lang. I haven't been able to find out what their initials stand for yet.

One of the reasons these are such sharp prints is that instead of using the original die to make a final die for a sheet, it was decided to print these singly from the original die. Normally, each stage in the process would lead to a slight loss of definition but by choosing to print singly, from the original die, they were able to assure the absolute top quality of the print.

edit: Found him. The engraver's name was Charles.

smithrhm97 · Post by **smithrhm97** » 26 Jun 2015 10:20

By request, the £25, £50 and £100 were offered as one lot. They sold for £160'000 plus 20% commission. That's just over A$325'000!!

The rest of the stamps managed to fetch just over A$130'000.

Rod Perry · Post by **Rod Perry** » 26 Jun 2015 15:46

Ricky

That £12,000 for the £2 denomination (SG £1,300) was extraordinary!

What on earth happened there; that denomination is about of equal rarity to mint of the 25s, 30s and 45s in my experience?

Rod

smithrhm97 · Post by **smithrhm97** » 26 Jun 2015 18:50

Unfortunately that was a mistake by the Auctioneer. It sold for £1'200, not £12'000. It was spotted early on but not before we uploaded the prices to the website.

Thanks for pointing that out. I will get the website corrected.

Rod Perry · Post by **Rod Perry** » 26 Jun 2015 21:44

Having been a philatelic auctioneer for over four decades, Ricky, I can quite understand how figures can go awry.

Rod

Didge · Post by **Didge** » 03 Jul 2015 12:47

Folks,

What a great looking set and a great result for the owner. It shows that new discoveries are still out there.

Tim

Global Administrator · Post by **Global Administrator** » 31 Jul 2015 19:51

Didge wrote:Folks,

What a great looking set and a great result for the owner. It shows that new discoveries are still out there.

Tim

Agree, $A325,000 is VERY serious money!

Great to see MAJOR new finds are still out there.

Great result by Feldman's.

They are a super pretty stamp trio, always loved the look of them.

I mailed this off today to a Royal Commissioner Judge here today - my tiny new discovery of the month, bearing a UNIQUE recorded date of AP-18-01.

The excellent 2013 Kellow/Turner/McCredie book p110, records 30 different dates on the £100 Victoria "Stamp Duty", but NOT this one, or on the £25 or £50 either. Cancelled in the COMMONWEALTH period, and technically an AUSTRALIAN era stamp.

Glen

ottawasteve · Post by **ottawasteve** » 01 Aug 2015 15:58

I watched these be bid upon in the Feldman sale (where I picked up a Madagascar Consular Post strip of four and a spectacular mint New Brunswick 1851 one shilling. Awesome.)

Probably the most aggressive and active bidding I have seen since the Dupont sale by Feldman a year ago.

They are truly lovely items.

Amazing that there are new discoveries in 2015. Thrilling, exciting. What a wonderful hobby.

Global Administrator · Post by **Global Administrator** » 13 Oct 2015 17:14

smithrhm97 wrote:
You can see all the stamps with the descriptions and estimates here:

http://www.davidfeldman.com/auctions/browse-lots/aucP/192-20 ... l/all/all/

Ricky .. well worth folks bookmarking those results!

Glen

smithrhm97 · Post by **smithrhm97** » 14 Oct 2015 01:09

They even got a mention in Stanley Gibbons' latest Investment Newsletter!...Of sorts.

A "unique series of GB Queen Victoria 'Revenue' stamps" apparently... Never mind. Nice of them to give us a mention at all to be honest.

jjarmstrong47 · Post by **jjarmstrong47** » 14 Oct 2015 10:03

Why do Stanley Gibbons make so many mistakes? They were not a GB issue.

Global Administrator · Post by **Global Administrator** » 02 Nov 2015 21:30

Rod Perry wrote:
Purves could account for the Ferrary set of Postal fiscals to £100, for it was he as a youthful entrant to the family's Purves & Purves legal firm who bought them at a Ferrary sale in the early 1920s, for considerably under face value.

The firm used the highest denomination stamps at full face on transfer of land title documents (the principal use for these stamps), and relished in being the "smartest young man in the firm for some time thereafter", as Purves once put it.

Well Purves was not THAT smart Rod .. had he retained them as mint, the trio might well have sold for $325,000!

Rod Perry · Post by **Rod Perry** » 03 Nov 2015 10:08

Ah, Glen, but if Purves had not used up the Ferrary set, there would have been another set on the market.

Would the Feldman set then have fetched that absurd figure?

Rod

Global Administrator · Post by **Global Administrator** » 12 Nov 2016 14:47

jjarmstrong47 wrote:Why do Stanley Gibbons make so many mistakes? They were not a GB issue.

True.

Machaggis52 · Post by **Machaggis52** » 13 Nov 2016 04:14

Robert1 wrote:
gugusg wrote:Haha, funny, this is french inside the stamp : "Honni soit qui mal y pense", from "ordre de la jarretière" it seems (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Order_of_the_Garter)

French indeed, translates to -

Shame be to him who thinks evil of it.

The other accepted translation is -

May he be shamed who thinks badly of it.

Or, Evil to he who evil thinks.