Waterlow & Sons and the 1894 set of North Borneo stamps

 

The early stamps of North Borneo between 1883 and 1892 were designed by Thomas Macdonald and printed by Blades, East and Blades in London. These were attractive and iconic but mono colour designs which were not shown at their best by the printing process of lithography.

In 1893, the British North Borneo Company who was perpetually short of money agreed with Waterlow's proposal of designing and printing a set of stamp pictorials for 1894. Selling the territory's stamps to collectors, especially at face value, was a significant part of their income. The earliest stamp pictorials were the Sidney Views from New South Wales, Australia in 1850. Their popularity with collectors really took off with the USA 1869 set of pictorials.  

They initially approach De La Rue for a quotation for a set based on the Company's Arms. They then decided to go to Waterlow & Sons who subsequently secured the contract. The designs were said to be inspired by the Waterlow printed Liberia 1892 set which has some values in a very attractive 2 colour scheme. The North Borneo 1894 set can be regarded as the first full set of pictorials with the border and vignette recess printed separately in two different colours.

The printing company of Waterlow & Sons has a very interesting history and story. In 1810, James Waterlow set up shop in the City of London reproducing legal documents by lithography. He flourished and by 1852 he had diversified into printing stamps, his first issue was the 1852 set British Guiana. As the business, James Waterlow's four sons joined the business and branches opened at Westminster and London Wall. In 1876 James died and a year later the business was split into two. The third son, Sir Sidney founded Waterlow & Sons based at the London Wall. This was the firm that printed this issue. However by 1920, this company and the other company founded by the elder two sons, Waterlow Brothers and Layton were reunited under the name of Waterlow & Sons Limited.  

The 1894 set

This was the first set of North Borneo stamps printed by Waterlow & Sons Ltd while the high values were still printed by Blades. The previous stamps though iconic were largely utilitarian. This 1894 Waterlow series is widely considered as a forerunner of modern pictorial stamps. Moreover, Waterlow used a dual recess printing process which produced stamps in two colours at a high level of detail and crispness that lithography can not match.

The use of exotic subject matter was unprecedented where most issues of British colonial stamps only featured the reigning monarch's head usually in one colour only. This issue featured indigenous wildlife and culture with the Dyak Chief (1c), Sambar Stag (2c), Sago Palm (3c), Great Argus Pheasant (5c), Estuarine Crocodile (12c) and Mount Kinabalu (18c) besides the Coat of Arms in 6c and 24c stamps. The subject material in the vignettes were printed separately from the surrounding borders. In a bold and modern move for the Victorian era, the designers allowed parts of the image to break through the surrounding frame or border. In the 5c stamp, the tail feathers of the Great Argus Pheasant stretched into the frame above while the tail of the Estuarine Crocodile lashed out into the border on the left side.  

5c with part Gayah cancellation and 12c double postage due

These are the details of the engravers and the die proof numbers and colours which are in the records of Waterlow & Sons. This among many other records were discovered in 1981. The total number of stamps printed for each value were:

1c five printings 600,000

2c four printings 440,000

3c three printings 360,000

5c two printings 285,000

6c two printings 280,000

8c two printings 260,000

12c one printing 200,000

18c one printing 200,000

24c one printing 200,000 

These beautiful Waterlow designs were very popular globally with collectors and large amounts of these stamps were cancelled to order (CTO) with the 14 bar bar cancellation to be sold at low prices. I think the figures given above are not a true reflection of the actual amount of stamps printed as there are vast amounts of these CTO stamps in existence.

The following 1897 set of pictorials were also designed and printed by Waterlow & Sons. The designs and themes are similar to the 1894 set with additional values and corrections made to include native script and Chinese characters in the added side tablets. This is a more beautiful set especially with the additional values of 10c with the sun bear and the really pretty 16c with a train running by a river in the countryside.  

Waterlow & Sons continued to design and print stamps for North Borneo until they were sold and the postal part of the business taken over by De La Rue in 1961. One of the significant highlights was the 50th Anniversary of the granting of the Royal Charter issue in 1931. This set of 8 stamps are among the most beautiful stamps of the colonial period.

Some North Borneo fiscal cancellations

 

The collecting of fiscal cancellations of North Borneo is now quite popular. Once upon a time, it was possible to purchase these stamps at a fraction of the normal price but no longer. Here are some nice cancellations, some of which have been reconstructed.

Elopura was the name give by its founder, William Pryer for Sandakan. But it soon reverted to its traditional name which was used for the original settlement on Timbang island deep inside Sandakan Bay which was also known as Bandar German or German Town due to the presence of early German traders. The original Elopura cancellation was used for some of the earliest of Sandakan covers in 1884. It had the prefix A or no prefix. This prefix P type was reintroduced as a fiscal cancellation in 1889 and 1890.

Marudu or Marudo or even Malloodoo was an old settlement in the Kudat area dating from the 15th century. Its interesting history has been written elsewhere on this blog. It is worth your while checking it all by using the search box at the top left of this page. Here we can see the original cancellation with Marudo had been modified to the accepted spelling of Marudu by slicing off the top part of the last letter of the fiscal chop.

This is a nice looking cancellation of the Government Of North Borneo Jesselton. This 1912 overprinted $5  is worth quite a bit mint or postally used. These large official fiscal cancels usually have the country's coat of arms. 

This is the cancellation in blue of the Government Of North Borneo Judicial Department. There are a few different governmental cancellations like this with the coat of arms in the middle. They are very attractive in contrast to most postal cancellations.

The Residency of Kudat chop was a very interesting fiscal cancellation from Kudat which was also used as a postal cancel before the very first postal cancellers arrived in 1884. I think this was used in 1883 and the Singapore transit cancellation confirms that it was used postally.

This is a very nice cancellation in blue which is seldom seen. It was used at the Registrar's Office at Sandakan.

The Residency of Sillam looks stunning in red. Somehow this small place on the east coast near Lahad Datu has some of the most sought after of cancellations. Its intaglio postal seal in both red and blue is also very beautiful. In the late 19th and early 20th centuries it was the research site for growing tobacco and other cash crops. In recent times, efforts are focused on restoring coastal ecosystems from the damage that occurred as a result of logging and oil palm cultivation in the area. The aim is to restore and increase biodiversity.