New Borneo 1950 Definitive Set

North Borneo
1950 Definitive Set
Updated - November, 2018

Identifying the New Borneo 1950 Definitive Set issues is very simple. There is only one listed color shade, and one spelling change for the 50c values. The set was created to replace the North Borneo issues that date back to 1939.

The stamps were printed by Harrison & Sons. They also printed the Mauritius second set, Seychelles, and Virgin Islands first set. You will notice that all of these sets were printed on paper that is different from the other Colony sets. This is especially true for hinged stamps. It is very difficult to remove hinges from any of these stamps.

The 50c value was originally printed with the wrong spelling for Jesselton. This was later corrected to Jesselton. See the enlarged spellings below:

CW 58 - Original Die - Jesselton misspelled - Jessleton

CW 59 - Redrawn Die - Jessleton corrected

Unlike modern stamps which are issued in the millions, definitive sets from this time period were issued very conservatively. I do not have the print quantities for these issues. Please feel free to supply the quantities if you have them.

The catalog numbers are from the 2008 Commonwealth King George VI Postage Stamp Catalogue (CW) published by Murray Payne, 2013 Stanley Gibbons Stamp Catalogue (SG) and the 2011 Scott catalog (ST). You can access the publishers using the "Links to British Colonial Stamp Sites" at the bottom of this page.

The images were saved in a larger size and at a higher resolution so you can more easily see the details used in sorting them. Please be patient if it takes a few minutes for this page to load. Although the two high values were issued first, the stamps are shown in value order below.



CW 48 - SG 356 - ST 244 1c Lake-Brown	CW 49 - SG 357 - ST 245 2c Grey-Blue	CW 50 - SG 358 - ST 246 3c Green


CW 51 - SG 359 - ST 247 4c Purple-Magenta	CW 52 - SG 360 - ST 248 5c Purple-Violet	CW 53 - SG 361 - ST 249 8c Red-Scarlet


CW 54 - SG 362 - ST 250 10c Purple-Brown	CW 55 - SG 363 - ST 251 15c Bright Ultramarine	CW 55a - SG 363 - ST 251 15c Blue


CW 56 - SG 364 - ST 252 20c Grey-Brown	CW 57 - SG 365 - ST 253 30c Bistre-Brown	CW 58 - SG 366 - ST 254 50c Carmine-Lake (Jessleton)


CW 59 - SG 366a - ST 259 50c Carmine-Lake (Jesselton)	CW 60 - SG 367 - ST 255 $1 Red-Orange	CW 61 - SG 368 - ST 256 $2 Grey-Green