A Kudat paquebot cancellation

The X'mas season is upon us once more. I am sharing with you this uncommon cover that I hope will show that Kudat did have a paquebot cancellation. This was originally in the Hosking collection.

It is rather strange that up till now that no paquebot cancellations were recorded from Kudat. It is after all a coastal town with a wharf and a regular stop for ships travelling from the east to the west coast and vice versa.

The above non boxed PAQUEBOT. cancellation was classified by Proud, wrongly in my view, as Jesselton SL3 based on another similar cover which somehow missed the Kudat cancellation and received the Jesselton K2 loose mail cancellation instead. The above cover was correctly endorsed by a Kudat D17 postmark. This is faint and should read 7 JAN 1936. It is very rare to see a Straits stamp with a North Borneo cancellation. By convention, the ship should have been registered in Singapore (part of Straits Settlements) and the letter posted in international waters. But I doubt whether these rules were strictly followed.

The back of the envelop was back stamped at Jesselton the day after. Apparently, it traveled on the SS Kajang. According to the BNB Herald, the SS Kajang left Sandakan on the 6th Jan 1936 on its way to Kudat. There you have it, the only prewar paquebot recorded for Kudat. I have not seen a post war Kudat paquebot either, I think. Rather strange is it not?