Tongan Stamp Issue

Causes A Fuss

Allegations that the Tongan Government was not “playing lr” followed a special issue of Tongan stamps in February, xe stamps were the first series to be overprinted locally, and cause, in addition, the issue was a small printing, it caused r ment in the philatelic world.

THE stamps were in the regular series, overprinted in red with the words, “1862—Tau’ataina Eman cipation—l 962”. This was to cele brate the centenary of Tongan Eman cipation.

The overprinting was done by the Tongan Government Printer and the sheets for the first time bore the legend, “Printed by Government Authority in Nukualofa, Tonga, R. S.

Wallbank”. The stamps themselves were printed by Bradbury, Wilkinson and Co. Ltd., of Surrey.

One of the stamps, ordinarily valued at 3d, was overprinted to the value of 2/-.

In addition, Tonga released its first official air mail series on the same date in February.

PIM in March (p. 113) reported that one sheet of the regular series containing 60 5/- stamps had been received in London in February with the overprint inverted. According to a spokesman from Stanley Gibbons Ltd., the value of this sheet was now £.10,000. Even without the error, the spokesman was reported as saying the overprint stamps “were worth about 50/- each.”

PIM correspondents in Suva and Nukualofa, and a staff correspondent in Sydney, followed the story up, with the result seen on this and the next page.

[?]er blocks from two of the stamps overprinted by the Tongan Government Printer.

The regular 3d stamp has also been altered to the 2/- denomination.