The last issue of North Borneo pictorial stamps in 1961

This was the last issue of pictorial stamps by North Borneo as well as the last printing of stamps by Waterlow & Sons for this part of the world. However, the last stamp issued by North Borneo was actually the Freedom From Hunger stamp in 1963 which was part of a commonwealth omnibus arrangement. It was obviously not a local design.

This was a two colour design recess printed in two steps with different printing plates for the border and the vignette. They were based on designs drawn by Chong Yun Fatt who was working at the agricultural department at Jesselton. They were in sheets of 100 watermark Block CA with a setting of 10x10. They were said to be perforated 13 but the long sides of the stamps were perforated nearer to 13.25 

Die Proofs

No die proofs were recorded in the company archives but in 2020, some came onto the market. The 4c, 5c, 12c, $2 and $5 separate border and vignette die proofs were listed. It is unclear as to whether these are the only surviving items or whether there are others squirreled away long term in vaults of certain dealers or collectors.

There were two vignette die proofs for the 4c in the different colours of cobalt blue and bronze green. The duller bronze green was chosen for the final stamp. The possible different and more exciting version has been shown in the above reconstruction.

In 1961, Waterlow was taken over by Purnell & Sons who very soon disposed of a large part of the printing division to another printer, Thomas De La Rue. There was only one printing of these stamps by Waterlow. The numbers are shown in the table above. The original printing plates were passed onto the new owners. 

Further printing of most of the values were carried out by DLR as shown in the above tables to satisfy demand. They were also in sheets of 100 with the same watermark. There were no DLR printings of the 4c, 20c, 35c, 50c, 75c, $5 and $10 without the Sabah overprint. The more frequent issuances of the 1c was due to philatelic demand for sheets and multiples rather than postal use. More 6c was needed as this was the local second class unsealed letter and printed paper rate. The 12c (2x6c) was the local rate as well as the surface rate to Sarawak, Malaya, Singapore and the Imperial rate. There was an ample amount of the 12c from initial Waterlow stock still available. 20c was the airmail rate to Malaya and Singapore from August 1959. More than 4 million 20c stamps were initially printed by Waterlow but more 10c were still printed. The North Borneo stamps of the 1961 set without overprint were withdrawn for sale at the post offices on 30 June 1964 but were still valid until 1 April 1970.

On 16 September 1963, North Borneo gained independence and officially changed its name to Sabah to become a state in the new nation of Malaysia. But it was not until 1 July 1964 that the name Sabah appeared in her stamps and postmarks. Prior to that, the remaining inventory of both the Waterlow and DLR printings were repatriated from North Borneo to Britain and overprinted "SABAH" and further stock were also printed.

There were a lot more of the Sabah overprints than what is in the above because many sheets of stamps were repatriated from the post offices in North Borneo to be overprinted. There are many interesting aspects to these two issues of stamps as well as differences between the Waterlow and De La Rue printings which will be discussed later.

References

Stanway, L C (2023) Malaysia and the Federation of Malaya - Their Stamps & Postal History. Chapter 13 pp 13.1 - 13.7

Stanley Gibbons Ltd (1970) Elizabethan Catalogue of Modern Commonwealth Stamps pp 472, 524