A Rare Stamp Escapes

One of Australia’s rarest stamps – a twopenny King Edward VIII stamp which was never issued because of the king’s abdication and was supposed to be burnt – has caused excitement among collectors after being listed for sale in Melbourne by an anonymous owner. The King Edward VIII twopenny scarlet - featuring an etching of the king in his naval uniform – was due to be issued by Australia’s Postmaster-General's department by Christmas in 1936 when the news came in that the British monarch had abdicated the throne on December 10 to marry Wallis Simpson, a divorced American socialite. The king had reigned for less than a year. Following the abdication, the Postmaster-General's department ordered the burning of the stamps, known as KEVIIIs, as well as the destruction of the proofs and the instruments used to produce them. However, a sheet of stamps survived: it had been sent as a souvenir to William Vanneck, the fifth Baron Huntingfield, the Queen’s representative in the state of Victoria, who had made a ceremonial visit to the stamp printing office in September. The government printer asked Lord Huntingfield to return the souvenir. He sent back the sheet of stamps, but six were missing from the lower right-hand corner. Lord Huntingfield explained that he had sent the six stamps to a friend in England who was a collector. According to Torsten Weller, head of philately at Australia’s Mossgreen auction house, the Postmaster-General then decided the final six stamps were too hard to retrieve. "Given the circumstances they basically gave up," Mr Weller told Australia’s Financial Review. But it later emerged that the six stamps had been sent to Sir William Vestey, the first Baron Vestey. They are believed to be Australia’s rarest stamps and are held neither by the Queen nor Australia Post. The stamps appeared in public at an exhibition in Melbourne in 1996. In 2014, Sir Samuel Vestey, a grandson of Sir William, sold the stamps at an auction in London; they were bought anonymously for £240,000. Last year, a KEVIII was sold by the anonymous owner who had removed the two left hand stamps. It fetched £100,000 – believed to be the record price for an Australian stamp. The auction house is hopeful that the second KEVIII, which goes on sale in Melbourne on June 26, may set a new record.