

The 1910 Reverend Robert Boyd postcard - coll. Fred Petit.
Written on 1 March 1910 - cancelled Port Vila 18 March 1910 - arrived in Sydney 24 March 1910.
The addressee: Mr. John Gavin Dunmore Lang, Dockra, Casula, (now 8 Dunmore Crescent), Liverpool, Sydney.
The only son of Dr. John Dunmore Lang, a well known Reverend.
The postcard is dated in manuscript 1 March 1910 but the Vila postmark says 18 (March) 19(10). As this cancel was carried by MALAITA I suppose that they cancelled the mails after leaving New Hebrides waters.
The card was carried by S.S. MALAITA. She left Sydney on 28 January 1910 for the New Hebrides via Lord Howe Island and Norfolk Island and returned on 24 March 1910..
The text:
S.W. Bay Malekula, New Hebrides, 1/3/10. Very many thanks for presents & papers. This is not good but you will see
what like the children are. This was taken at Tangoa by Dr. G.
This photographer can only have been Dr. William Gunn of Futuna. He was a passionate photographer. Many pictures from him are known.
The Presbyterian Mission at Tangoa, Santo, was the place for the Mission Synod 1908, so Dr. William Gunn was there most likely.
The missionary at South West Bay, Malekula, and writer of this Photocard was Rev. Robert Boyd who came to the New Hebrides in 1895.
He was born on 20 April 1865 in Bridgend, Scotland.
On 24 April 1901 he married Mary Young Paterson, daughter of Robert Smith Paterson, minister of Pyrmont, Sydney, born 1868 in Sydney.
Robert & Mary had one child in 1902 but it died after one day. Later they had three children with the names Robert, John & Mary.
The two boys were born on 19.7.1903 in Dip Point, Ambrym and on 20.3.1905 in Mosman NSW.
I don't know when Mary, later Mary McRoberts (+ 3.7.1987 in Australia), was born.
Mary Young Paterson died in Wintua, Malekula on 14 June 1927, Robert on 14 July 1940 in Gatton, Queensland. He drowned himself in a well on the property of his daughter
because he was angst-ridden for his mental health.
It is astonishable what such a photo postcard can tell....
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This stamp tells us a bit how things worked in the New Hebrides in 1910.
The date of the cancel is 20 AP 1910. The "10" of 1910 is stuck into the cancel upside down, so are the "20" and the "AP" but it could also be the other way round. Who cared - they took it easy in the islands! The letter with this stamp must have come from an outer island as this PM1 cancel was only used for mail from the interisland ship.
MALAITA left Sydney on 1 April 1910 and reached Vila on 12 April. She received cargo from the TAMBO and left again for Sydney on 19 April arriving there on 28 April. So she did NOT carry the letter with this stamp - do we have to search for more?
Captain Wheaterall came with the MALAITA and changed command to MATUNGA. He left Sydney on 1 May arriving at Vila on 16 May.
There she transshipped with the TAMBO and went back on 20 May. The TAMBO continued her interisland runs which she began on March 3 from Sydney. This was her last New Hebrides run, she returned to Sydney on 27 June and later was placed on the Gilbert
& Ellice run until she sunk on 10 September 1919 at Abemama Island.
On Saturday 27 May 1910 the MATUNGA of Burns Philp & Co. Ltd, Captain Weatherall arrived in Sydney.
So did MATUNGA carry the letter on which this stamp was affixed?
But we must not forget that the French had ships too: The Messageries Maritimes steamer PACIFIQUE, Captain Chavin, left Sydney on 26 April 1910 for her Nouméa - Port-Vila - Nouméa run and returned on 15 May.
She could as well have carried this letter and the letter would have been in Sydney a week earlier.
It is not likely that the letter being in the TAMBO Burns Philp system was later carried ba a French ship but we cannot exclude this.
This shows how difficult it is to check the routes a letter went.

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4 June 1910
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The 20 September 1910 Postmaster Roy letter to Talence Gironde France - coll. "SeSi".
Written on 20 September 1910 at Condominium Post Office, Vila. Backstamped Sydney 3 October 1910, the day when Messageries Maritimes steamer PACIFIQUE, captain Coad
arrived in Sydney having left Nouméa on 29 September so she left Vila on 28 September supposedly. Backstamped Talencs on 6 November 1910.
The fact that this cover has a Sydney backstamp tells me that it was not carried further by a Messageries Maritimes ship but by an English Mail Ship. (Mail to Messageries Maritimes ships
was tranfered directly without going through Sydney PO)
A search reveals that Orient Line's RMS OSTERLEY, W.J. Jenks commander, left Sydney on 1 October, Melbourne on 5 October, Adelaide on 7 October and Freemantle on 11 October.
The Sydney Morning Herald tells us that mail was dispatched to Adelaide on 4 October train to reach OSTERLEY (Information thanks to Jeff Blinco). The ship called at Colombo on 20, Suez on 29 Oct and Port Said on
30 Oct. Naples was reached on 3 November, Marseilles on 5 Nov. and London on 11 November. Mail reached London on 6 November.
So this letter was carried by train from Naples to France so it reached Talence on 6 November too.

The dubious KARL F. BUESS covers to Pforzheim
At the moment we hold that these covers carry real stamps and are genuinely canceled but far later than in 1910. There exist zillions of such stamps on paper with the same dates. I wonder what the purpose of this action was.
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