Reunion was not occupied before the French came. So perhaps the clean slate would mean less colonial baggage. Perhaps not though when the first residents who create the island’s heritage are mutineers. So slip on your smoking jacket, fill your pipe, take your first sip of your adult beverage, and sit back in your most comfortable chair. Welcome to todays offering from The Philatelist.
The French were wonderful for showing the exotic aspects of empire on their stamps. So a tall waterfall cascading down the wet side of a volcanic mountain can get the juices flowing of a stamp collector cooped up in a French city. To be more modern after the war, outposts like Reunion were made overseas departments of France. By extension then they are now far off outposts of the European Union. To bad the EU does not do postage stamps for their empire.
Todays stamp is issue A22, a one Centime stamp issued by the French colony of Reunion in 1933. It was part of a 41 stamp issue in various denominations, this one showing the Salazie waterfall. According to the Scott catalog, the stamp is worth 25 cents unused. A version of this stamp without the RF means it was from the Vichy government of France during the wartime German occupation. They are not real as they did not actually make it to the island for use in postage, getting them to stamp dealers was the priority.
Reunion is a volcanic island in the Indian ocean east of Madagascar. There were no natives however the islands over time had been spotted by ancient mariners from Indonesia, Arabie, and Portugal. France was the first to leave people there in 1642 when 12 mutineers were left there after being part of a failed mutiny in Madagascar. French King Charles IV had dreams of France prospering off the India trade, and personally provided 20% of the equity for the French East India Company. The company planned trading posts in India as well as Reunion, Mauritius, and Madagascar. Reunion was not yet called that. The French East India Company replaced the Portuguese given name of Saint Apollonia with the name Bourbon after the French Royal House and in honor of Charles IV’s money. The Company was not able to bring in the hoped for profits with several outposts failing and several recapitalizations.
The French Revolution then intruded. First the new name Reunion after the joining of revolutionaries from Marseilles with the National Guard in Paris in 1792. More importantly, the revolutionary government in France ended the monopoly of French trade with the east and soon the French East India Company was bankrupt with the assets reverting to the state. Napoleon tried to change the name of the island to Bonaparte but that did not stick with the Bourbon name coming back during a brief wartime British occupation. The troubles of 1848 then brought back the name Reunion which has stuck.
The island during the war affiliated with Vichy France. The Free French had other ideas. The elderly French destroyer Leopard had escaped to Portsmouth in England during the fall of France. After convoy escort duty, it was modified in South Africa for Free French colonial duty. An engine and a gun were removed so extra fuel and 80 French marines could be carried. The Leopard was resisted by the Shore Battery and it took several days of fighting before the Vichy administration gave up. The ship later was written off after it ran aground in Libya in confusion after a German attack.
The rebellious spirit of the island was shown again recently. The problem of childhood poverty on Reunion was addressed when 1630 children were moved to France and made available for adoption. As adults the adopted children filed repeated lawsuits that the movement to France was against their will and not adequate screening of adoptive families was done. The lawsuits were all thrown out of court but it is a twist to have immigrants claiming ill will in bringing them to an advanced country.
Well my drink is empty and I will pour another to toast the adoptive parents of the children from Reunion. The grown up children may romanticize what their life would have been like in the tropical paradise as shown on the stamps, but they were saved from a life of deprivation. Come again tomorrow for another story that can be learned from stamp collecting.
2 replies on “Reunion 1933, Reuniting with mutineers”
Poor Napoleon! He couldn’t catch a break!
I borrowed a pipe from that nice young man with a tattoo next door, and would Nestle’s Quick chocolate milk qualify as an adult beverage? Don’t think I have a smoking jacket, but I do have a Lost in Space t-shirt!
Eric, perhaps you should find a tailor, but perhaps not a Swift one. Watch out for neighbors pipes, but if you want to stay Lost in Space, try reading this one I wrote about Soviet cosmonaut school, see https://the-philatelist.com/2019/09/27/soviet-union-1980-20-years-of-cosmonaut-training-at-the-yuri-gagarin-center/