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Auction: 20024 - The "Dubois" British Commonwealth Collection of Stamps and Covers
Lot: 240

British Solomon Islands
1907 Large Canoe Issue
1907 (29 May) envelope to Somerset and redirected locally, bearing 2d. tied by light Tulagi c.d.s. with another strike alongside, in combination with N.S.W. 2d. tied by Sydney c.d.s. (8.6) and additionally tying the Canoe 2d., two arrival datestamps (15.7) at left. A very rare and previously unrecorded cover of which very few are known

Note: This letter was written by Rev. Dr. Henry Welchman, an Anglican missionary,
Born in Lichfield in 1850, and educated at Queen's College in Birmingham, Henry Welchman qualified as a surgeon and worked in his father's practice. He held a license as a lay preacher, and had contacts with former Melanesian Mission staff, including Bishop J.R. Selwyn. Welchman joined the Melanesian Mission in 1888 as a layman. After a short posting on Santa Cruz, he arrived on Isabel Island in 1890. He returned to England in 1891 to nurse the ailing Bishop Selwyn.. He was ordained a deacon in Auckland in March 1892 and a priest in June 1893, and then divided his next years between Isabel and Norfolk Island. In July 1896 he married a member of the Norfolk Islands staff, Helen Rossiter. They moved to Siota, and she became one of the first European women to live in the Solomon Islands, until her death there from dysentery three months later, on 12 January 1897.

Welchman chose to devote himself to the people of Isabel and never returned to Norfolk Island. He became a common sight travelling around Isabel on his small schooner "Ruth". He spent time at Siota in the late 1890s, and opened a new station on Lilihigua adjacent to Isabel. His health began to fail and he returned to England in 1901 and to New Zealand in 1906 where he died on 12 November 1908.


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Sold for
£2,400

Starting price
£2400