Blue Mauritius, book cover

Welcome to the Blue Mauritius Research Companion

This website contains biographical and bibliographical information about the Post Office Mauritius stamps and subjects related to them. It is based on my research for the book Blue Mauritius: The Hunt for the World's Most Valuable Stamps.

Post Office Mauritius (16), one penny, used (XVI) (1847)

  • Image of Post Office Mauritius (16), one penny, used (XVI)
From
1847
To
1847
Functions
Stamp
Location
Private hands
Summary

1d. Used. Heavily cancelled with an obliteration of parallel bars. The stamp is cut into on the right and has been repaired along the left-hand side.

Details

Events

1847
Used on a letter to Borchard at Bordeaux.
1864
Found by Madame Borchard.
1865
Madame Borchard exchanged the stamp with, or sold it to, a Bordeaux collector named Schiller.
1897
Dealer Marcel Pouget bought Schiller’s collection in January, then sold it to G. Kirchner for Fr.10,000 (£400) in April.
1899
Bought by Eugen Lentz for 9,000 marks (£450).
date (?)
Acquired by Russian collector Frederick Breitfuss (1851–1911), who formed the third greatest general collection, after Tapling and Ferrary, in the nineteenth century.
1907
Stanley Gibbons Ltd bought the Breitfuss collection.
1908
German dealer Philipp Kosack bought the stamp at auction and subsequently advertised it for sale.
date (?)
By 1914, Le Comte de Ramaix, of Antwerp, had paid Fr.18,000 for the stamp.
1919
Bought at auction by F. B. Smith in May and auctioned again in June by Harmer, Rooke & Co., when it was bought for cash, £480.
date (?)
Acquired by A. W. Cox some time between 1919 and 1933.
193 (?)
Auctioned by Edgar Mohrmann.
1933
Auctioned by H. R. Harmer in June, described as ‘repaired’, and sold for £320. The sale was cancelled after the purchaser submitted the stamp to the expert committee of the Royal Philatelic Society London, who refused to give it a certificate. The stamp was again auctioned by H. R. Harmer in September and sold without guarantee to the dealer Dr Paul Wolf. German dealer Philipp Kosack then bought the stamp for about £500.
1938
Auctioned by Heinrich Köhler, in Berlin, after having changed hands several times in the interim.
1952
Auctioned by Heinrich Köhler and bought by a Bavarian philatelist for 29,700 marks.

Prepared by: Helen Morgan

Dealers

Original Recipient

Owner

Related Cultural Artefacts

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Bibliography

Books

Journal Articles

Journal Notes