Commonwealth firsts
21 SEPTEMBER 1847, MAURITIUS
The big surprise
The first commonwealth country (and the fourth in the world) to issue postage stamps did so as part of an overhaul of its internal postal service. This had been started by the French, abandoned by the British and partially revived in 1834. An official Ordinance of December 1846 states that postage was to be prepaid by adhesive stamps.
Fortunately, the remote colony had the talent to produce them, but only by chance. Joseph Osmond Barnard was a stowaway on a ship bound for Australia. But he was discovered and put ashore at Port Louis, where he set up in business as a miniature painter, engraver and teacher of drawing. Having won the contract to produce the stamps, he engraved two values, 1d and 2d, on the same copper plate, with just one engraving of each. This made printing a laborious business, nevertheless, he produced 500 copies of each stamp in two print runs of 700 and 300 stamps. They quickly sold out, so when it came to produce more, he made some changes. Now, there were two plates, each with a block of twelve engravings; the inscription read ‘Post Paid’ and from 1848 to 1859, they printed stamps until the
