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Lot 372
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10 letters, 41pp, Details Early Plantation & Postal History of the British Solomon Islands
10 letters, 41pp, Details Early Plantation & Postal History of the British Solomon Islands
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Description:

Solomon Islands
Solomon Islands; Sussex, England, 1872, 1909-1910, 1919, 1928
10 letters, 41pp, Details Early Plantation & Postal History of the British Solomon Islands
Archive
[SOLOMON ISLANDS.] Archive of correspondence, 1872, 1909-1910, 1919, 1928. Ten letters, 41 pp. General toning; in protective sleeves in binder; very good.

This archive of letters tells two parallel stories of the early years of the British Solomon Islands Protectorate. A young British "colonial" wrote the first three letters to his uncle in England, detailing his efforts to establish a coconut and rubber plantation in the Solomon Islands with a group of indentured native boys supplying the labor. The second series of five letters are written by Charles M. Woodford, the first Resident Commissioner of the British Solomon Islands Protectorate, provides his reminiscences about the early postal history of the Solomon Islands, including his design for the first postage stamps in 1906-1907, to a noted British attorney and philatelist. A sixth letter from Woodford's wife thanks their correspondent for a copy of his book and regrets that her husband did not live to see it in print.

Details and Excerpts
- Eric P. Monckton, Autograph Letter Signed, to William P. Monckton, "Uncle Parry," October 13, 1909, British Solomon Islands, 6 pp., 8" x 10.25".
"I am starting here Cocoanut planting, and a little Rubber and Cocoa growing too I think Cocoanuts take about 5 years before I get any return, the others take about 3 years. I might also put in Corn as a catch crop, meaning that I get quick returns which I want." (p1)
"I have here 24 boys indentured for 3 years @ £6 a year wages; wages to be paid at the end of their indenture i.e. I have to find £432 in 3 years time to pay off the boys." (p2)
"I have here about 2,500 acres of land freehold which I payed about £50 for from the natives; too much land for what I want, so I dare say I could raise money on the place in three years time if it was necessary; but that is no good to me. The nearest white man is 5 miles away from him. that is the government station & Burns Philps store & port of call of the steamer; once every two months from Sydney, & a fortnight later on her return from Cooktown; she goes from Sydney to Cooktown and back running through the Solomon Islands & British New Guinea." (p3)
"I feed the boys on rice; & tin meat once a week. I have been living on that myself with tea & sugar; but I hope to be comfortably settled before very long." (p3)
"I feel very lonely here & company is what I want; and I can't find a girl that will have me, after all there is nothing like being single." (p4)
"I had to wait 2½ months for my labour which was very trying. There are recruiters here, who recruit Malaita boys and charge £6 per head a lot, & I had to wait my turn. The local boys are no good for working; they are good boat boys though, & my crew will consist of them. Malaita is an Island at the other end of the Solomon Islands." (p5)

- Eric P. Monckton, Autograph Letter Signed, to William P. Monckton, "Uncle Parry," May 27, 1910, British Solomon Islands, 4 pp., 4.5" x 7".
"It is time I wrote you again letting you know that I am still alive. Just heard sad news of the Kings death it will be a terrible & serious loss to the British Empire, & just now when things are so unsettled at home." (p1)
"I am afraid we Colonials (for I suppose I must call myself such) are not as particular as you English aristocrats who the girls parents were or grand parents, as long as they are Gentlefolk & behave as such." (p2-3)
"My work here is going ahead steadily and satisfactorily; I am going to put in Para Rubber. I was wondering what Ivor was going to do. I was wondering if he would care to come out & join me. I am short of cash. If he joined me it would be very nice for me he could have a ½ share if he came with money to keep things going, with £1500 I could make a fortune in Cocoa nuts & Rubber, & Catch crops; would do things in a bigger way than I am doing at present." (p3-4)
King Edward VII died on May 6, 1910, at the age of 68. His only living son succeeded him as King George V (1865-1936).
Ivor Parry Monckton (1892-1978) was William P. Monckton's son and Eric P. Monckton's first cousin.

- Eric P. Monckton, Autograph Letter Signed, to William P. Monckton, "Uncle Parry," October 30, 1910, British Solomon Islands, 4 pp., 8" x 10.125".
"A nice sort of life for a young fellow to lead, isn't it? no sport no society no nothing, why do I do it; I am doing it of my own free will. I am looking to the future, & have made up my mind to a few years of solitary imprisonment." (p3)
"I have had notice that Trocas shells are up in value £18-£20 per ton so I sent my boat out on to the reef after them. I hope to have a shipment this steamer of 3 to 4 tons 10 boys will collect this in two weeks, so I will make a good profit on their labour @ 10/ a month = £2-10-0 cost. Total profit of £57-10-0 which is not bad for 2 weeks work. I hope the price will keep up."
Troca shells are the shells of a type of sea snail harvested for the mother of pearl layer inside that could be used to make pearl buttons and jewelry.

-Charles M. Woodford, Autograph Letter Signed, to R. P. Croom-Johnson, March 5, 1919, Partridge Green, Sussex, 2 pp., 4.5" x 7".
"I shall be very glad to give you what information I can upon the early postage stamps of the Solomon Islands Protectorate and I was myself responsible for the first issue. It will take me some little time to look up dates and references but you shall hear from me again in a few days." (p1)

- Charles M. Woodford, Autograph Letter Signed, to R. P. Croom-Johnson, March 7, 1919, Partridge Green, Sussex, 4 pp., 4.5" x 7".
"I am sending you under separate cover some notes I have written out for you in connection with the introduction of the Solomon Il. Postage stamps." (p1)
"Formerly our official Gazette was the Fiji Gazette until I pointed out that we in the Solomon Ils had no interest in advertisements of Indians lost cattle & dogs and registrations of new cow brands so they gave the W. P. its own Gazette, for which of course we have to pay." (p1-2)
"I should tell you that when I gave Smith the order to print the stamps I made him enter into a bond in £500 to destroy all spoiled sheets and not to print more than the number ordered and to clean off the stones when the printing was finished. I paid a solicitor in Sydney £3-3-0 for preparing the bond.... Sometime about 1910 Smith floated his business into a limited company and retired on account of ill health. His Secretary got hold of the stones and had some sheets printed. It appeared they had not been cleaned off. I put a solicitor to work and recovered all the sheets struck off which had been sold to Sydney dealers. The sheets recovered were sent to me all all destroyed and the stones were finally cleaned off. Old Smith was very much upset over the business but assumed full responsibility although the solicitor I employed on that occasion said the bond was probably worthless. Smith paid the costs like a man but died shortly afterwards. The Secretary was not prosecuted but ought to have been."

- Charles M. Woodford, Autograph Letter Signed, to R. P. Croom-Johnson, March 27, 1919, Partridge Green, Sussex, 7 pp., 8" x 13".
"I am glad you have found the notes I gave you about the B.S.I. postage stamps useful." (p1)
"The first trading steamer visited the Solomons from Sydney about 1894, but it was only a single trip. Messrs. Burns Philp & Co. of Sydney established the regular line about 1896, but one of the sailing traders continued for about two yrs. later." (p2)
"The end of Nov. 1906 arrived and the R.C. [Resident Commissioner Charles M. Woodford] had heard nothing further about the expected stamps so he decided to act himself. Estimates and designs were asked for from some firms of printers and engravers in Sydney for the cost of printing certain stamps. The designs supplied were of the most weird description but the cost of engraving and lithographing appeared to be very moderate. The R.C. therefore proposed a design and from it Mr. W. E. Smith of Bridge Street Sydney produced the seven values of the first issue. The stamps being sixty on a sheet. All sheets of each value numbered consecutively, one thousand sheets of each of the four lower values and five hundred sheets of each of the three higher values were printed. The stamps arrived about the middle of March and upwards of £40 worth were sold by the end of the month, more than enough to pay for the printing." (p6)
"The stamps cannot be considered as things of beauty or well produced but they served their purpose." (p6)

- Charles M. Woodford, Autograph Letter Signed, to R. P. Croom-Johnson, March 28, 1919, Partridge Green, Sussex, 3 pp., 4.5" x 7".
"There is one small matter in connection with the first issue of B.S.I stamps which I forgot to mention. I am not acquainted with the process of producing stamps by lithography, but a copper plate with the design engraved upon it was prepared of a single stamp the plate being about the size of an ordinary ladies visiting card. I presume the designs on the stones were produced in some way which I do not understand from this copper plate. When the stamps were printed, Smith the printer returned the copper plate to me. I retained it until the stamps were destroyed and it was then defaced and destroyed being thrown into the sea in 25 fathoms. I would if you could spare me a set of the first issue at a moderate price I had given up collecting and sold all my stamps but I find the call quite irresistible." (p1-3)

- Charles M. Woodford, Autograph Letter Signed, to R. P. Croom-Johnson, April 18, 1919, Partridge Green, Sussex, 4 pp., 4.5" x 7".
"The palm trees on each side of the canoe in the first issue of Solomon Il. stamps are intended to represent Coco-nut Palms as copra is the chief article of export from the Solomons. The three objects in the foreground of the first issue were intended in the design I supplied to the printer Smith to represent one, a turtle in the centre (producing tortoiseshell) the others a pearl shell and a large green snail shell. All of these were important articles of export, but they are quite indistinguishable as the objects they are intended to represent in the completed stamps." (p1-2)
Copra is the dried, white flesh of the coconut, from which coconut oil is extracted. The by-product of copra meal is typically fed to horses, cattle, and sheep.

- Florence M. Woodford, Autograph Letter Signed, to R. P. Croom-Johnson, September 30, 1928, West Grimstead, Sussex, 3 pp., 4.5" x 7".
"Thank you very much for sending me your book on the Stamps of the British Solomon Islands. it was most kind of you to remember me. It is also a great grief to me that my husband never lived to see the book published. he would have been so interested in it." (p1)
"It has always been a great comfort to me that I was able to be with my husband in the Islands from the beginning of his administration there, with its many difficulties & problems, at the same time with its intense interest & to see the Islands gradually develop under his wise & just government." (p2)

- John Muir, Autograph Letter Signed, to "Blackie" [John Stuart Blackie], May 13, 1872, Cologne, Prussia, 4 pp., 5.5" x 8.5". Attached to backing paper; frayed right edge, affecting text.
This letter focuses on a visit by John Muir (1810-1882) to the University of Leiden in the Netherlands and his planned visit to Leipzig. Muir was a British Sanskrit scholar and judge in British India. In 1853, he returned to Edinburgh, where he endowed the chair of Sanskrit at the University of Edinburgh. His brother William Muir was a Scottish Orientalist, Lieutenant Governor of the North-Western Provinces of British India (1868-1876), and Principal of the University of Edinburgh (1885-1903).
John Stuart Blackie (1809-1895) was a Scottish classicist known for his translations of Greek texts. He held a professorship of Greek at the University of Edinburgh (1852-1882).

Historical Background
The United Kingdom proclaimed a British protectorate over the Southern Solomon Islands in 1893, and a Resident Commissioner was first appointed in 1896. In 1898, the Santa Cruz group of islands was added to the protectorate, and in 1899, the Northern Solomon Islands were transferred from German control to be included in the protectorate. In 1896, there were approximately 50 white residents of the Solomon Islands, all males.

The British Solomon Islands Protectorate continued until 1978 when the Solomon Islands became independent as a member of the British Commonwealth. It has a population of approximately 750,000 residents.

Eric Parry Monckton (1883-1953) was born in Queensland, Australia, to Hugh Monckton and Isabel Jane Gillis Chapman. By 1901, he was living in Northamptonshire, England, where he was a student in a boys' grammar school. In 1917, he married Minna Erhard, and they had at least two children. In 1949, he was living in New South Wales, Australia.

William Parry Monckton (1846-1914) was born in Allahabad, Uttar Pradesh, India, while his father was in the East India Company Service. He graduated from Cambridge University with a Bachelor of Arts and received a commission in the British Army in 1869. In 1891, he married Florence Georgina Sawrey-Cookson, and they had two children. He gained the rank of Lieutenant-Colonel in the Hampshire Regiment in 1892. Later living in Gloucestershire, England, he held the office of Justice of the Peace.

Charles Morris Woodford (1852-1927) was born in Gravesend, Kent, England, and studied at Tonbridge School from 1864 to 1871. In the early 1880s, he worked for the colonial government in Fiji and took three voyages to the Solomon Islands as a naturalist. In 1885 and 1886, he made three unsuccessful attempts to reach the center of Guadalcanal to collect specimens for the British Museum. As an assistant commissioner for the British Western Pacific Territories, Woodford investigated the economic feasibility of a British Solomon Islands Protectorate and purchased the small island of Tulagi, which became his administrative center. In 1889, he married Florence Margaret Palmer (1863-1932) in New South Wales, Australia, and they had at least three children over the next decade. In 1897, the Colonial Office appointed Woodford as the Resident Commissioner for the Solomon Islands and ordered him to control coercive labor recruitment practices and stop the illegal trade in firearms. As commissioner, he also established the first mail service from the islands, which traveled by sealed bag to Sydney, New South Wales. Woodford served as the first Resident Commissioner of the Solomon Islands Protectorate from 1896 to 1915.

Reginald Powell Croom-Johnson (1879-1957) was born in Bristol, England, and graduated from London University with a law degree. He began his career as a solicitor in 1901, was called to the bar, Inner Temple, in 1907, and was appointed Kings Counsel in 1927. He served as recorder of Bath (1928-1938) and judge in the King's Bench Division of the High Court of Justice (1938-1954). From 1929 to 1938, he was a Conservative Member of Parliament for Bridgwater. He was a noted philatelist and assembled a specialist collection of stamps of the British Solomon Islands. He published a book on the subject in 1927.

This item comes with a Certificate from John Reznikoff, a premier authenticator for both major 3rd party authentication services, PSA and JSA (James Spence Authentications), as well as numerous auction houses.

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