Show Your British Empire Covers & Postal History Here

More Solomon Islands, and another Reverend Voyce cover.

This cover was posted on board AV Cicely II. The cover was date stamped at Kira Kira on 16 July 1956 and is backstamped Rabual, Papua New Guinea 7 August 1956.

The post office at Kira Kira had been opened two years earlier.

Talking about Rev. Voyce, I have this item from Funafuti in the Gilbert and Ellice Islands:

Rod, Nice texting job on the Nivanga! A couple of typos:

Where you say Solomon & Tuvalu it should be Kiribati and Tuvalu.

Also, the ship was originally called Nivanga, and renamed Nivaga I in 1989 when a new ship built in England arrived in Tuvalu in 1989 that was named Nivaga II. The second "n" was dropped in the name as Tuvalu "officially" dropped "ng" from their alphabet.

Here is a maiden voyage cover of the Nivaga II:

The dilapidated Nivaga I was eventually sold to a company in Fiji and was renamed, but I am not sure the name, and a stamp was eventually issued by Fiji. I will have to dig out that info.

Edit:

It was NOT renamed, I snaggle-daggled this image from a well known auction site .

You know, BeeSee, I was going to broach that subject,
then I thought it was just too much trouble,
and just too deep for my interest in the subject.
I was looking for Nivanga and came across the Nivaga
and it was kind of "What the?"
I thought they had misspelled the name,
then I checked the images and the ship looked more modern.

I am glad you have explained, it all makes sense now.

Here is the image I first came across with the query.

Nice shot of the Nivaga II Rod. I added the Nivanga I Fiji stamp in the thread above.

Hi, Commonwealth postal history is not my strong suit..but I would like to contribute !

Interesting story BeeSee! so the Tuvaluan spelling is similar to the traditional spelling of Tonga (Toga) in Tongan and I think also similar to the spelling of the same sound in Samoan.

That is correct, Nigelc. The Tuvaluan "g" is pronounced "ng" as in sing, Like in Samoa, Tonga and Tokelau.

Memories of studying Thai at AUA in Bangkok,
"ng" was always a curly one for the students.
"ngor ngoo" = snake

BeeSee,
what do you do when studying/assessing stationery/covers,
in regards to postal rates?
I went looking for rates regarding the 1/- UPU on plateflaw's
example, and could not find anything anywhere on postage rates.
You have any advice? links?
Thanks.

Phil, Australia "FPO 30" was Iwakuni Japan

Iwakuni during the Korean War was a base for Australian, British, Canadian, South African and American air forces and personnel. Accordingly the AFPO 30 office handled many different mails.

Your cover is, however, the first cover featuring Singapore stamps I have seen passing through AFPO 30. Very nice and collectable. Thanks for sharing philb.



Australian Army PO 214 sold British as well as Australian stamps, and here is a cover bearing an Indian stamp. Army PO 214 had moved to Tokyo in September 1946.

Australian Army PO 214 postmark
featured in 3 theatres
Lae New Guinea
Tokyo Japan or
Korea

Phil Collas in The Postal History of Australian Forces in Japan and Korea, 1945-1957 states that:




This is a stationery envelope for the Yokohoma branch of the Chartered Bank of India.