Bruce Conde

Amongst other countries, I collect Yemen stamps, from forerunners of Ottoman Empire vintage up to the end of the civil war in 1970. There's a lot of interesting material during this latter period but a lot of it is unashamedly philatelic, particularly from The Mutawakelite Kingdom of Yemen, and the origin of much of it points to the enigmatic figure of Bruce Conde.

Bruce seems to have been one of the last great adventurers of the 20th century, and possibly the last of his kind. His stay in Yemen coincides with the appearance of numerous philatelic varieties: perf. and imperf. varieties of the same issue, minature sheets, spurious overprint varieties, etc. Indeed, I understand he even styled himself Postal Advisor to his life-long pen pal and son of the Imam, Muhammad al Badr.

There is plenty to be found out about his involvement with the Trucial States in the early 1960s, for example here:

http://friends.peoria.lib.il.us/com...eStamps.html

However, I can't find very much at all about his philatelic involvement in Yemen. Can anyone help with any information?

Thx, Tim H

I can't help you out with the information you are seeking Tim but very interesting post. I was recently working on a couple of Trucial States in past little while.

Dianne

Hi Tim H,

I have been working on a listing of Bruce Condé's articles. The page is at http://www.ohmygosh.on.ca/stamps/yemen/conde.htm .

Best wishes,
AndrewG

Andrew, thanks for the link. He was pretty prolific, and given the nature of some of the accusations around him one can't help wondering how many of these articles were self-promotion, or even basic propaganda. I'll have to start tracking down some of these and have a read.

Andrew, sorry for the late reply. We had a presentation at our local Philatelic Society last night on the postal history of Oman. naturally, Youssef Tadros' name came up in association with the Dhufar and State of Oman cinderellas.

It's well known that Bruce Conde and Youssef Tadros were together at the opening of the Sharjah post office in 1963, but do you know whether they continued their involvement further into that decade (and into the 70s)? Their modus operandi seems too similar for there not to have been some involvement from Conde in both the Trucial States "wallpaper stamps" and the Dhufar escapade, however peripheral.

Tim

Damn, you cost me money! Your post triggered a long-suppressed intention to get Norman Lewis's Sea and Sand in Arabia, which was based on his, I think, intelligence-sponsored visit to Aden and Yemen in the 1930s. Minutes later, I'd blown more money on Abebooks.

I picked up a Yemen collection on Marini leaves a year or two back - lots of gaps, sadly. I formed the view - a gut feeling, not the result of research - that pretty much everything was attractive, but philatelic. I wonder just how many genuinely postally used stamps exist?

Geoff

Prince of Conde.

Splendid! Thanks for sharing this clipping with us. I guess that proves a very good point, and kind of answers my question.

Unfortunately, I did not source or date the clipping.
It would , most possibly come from the "Australian Stamp Monthly"
as an article taken from the British Stamp Magazine of the same time,
(The name escapes me)

They oftentimes shared news articles.