Malasia stamp – The-Philatelist

The Sultan of Brunei offers a territory to a British adventurer in perpetuity, until it isn’t. 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.

Todays stamp comes from the island of Borneo. The area of Sarawak was ruled by a white rajah, in a system loosely modeled on British India, except with a more prominent local representation. This local representation allows the white rajah to just wear an ordinary business suit on the stamp. He did not have to pretend he was local when he was not as with so many Kings who are really from somewhere else.

The stamp today is issue A17, a 3 cent stamp issued by the Rajah of Sarawak in 1922. The stamp features Rajah Charles Vyner Brooke and is part of a 21 stamp issue in various denominations. According to the Scott Catalog, the stamp is worth $1.40 used. The stamp to look out for in this issue is the 8 cent yellow. It is worth $70 used.

Sarawak, initially just the area around Kuching was awarded to British explorer James Brooke. He had helped the Sultan of Brunei quell a tribal uprising. The area was populated by Muslim Malayan tribes with a minority of ethnic Chinese. Brooke established a Rajah that was independent from Britain. He was succeeded by his nephew and then later by his nephew’s son, Charles Vyner Brooke. The rajah was successful in developing the local industry, most particularly oil drilling. He had a local council that advised him and for the most part was a protector of local customs, with the exception of headhunters who were pursued until the practice mostly died out locally.

Charles Vyner Brooke faced a new challenge in the form of Japanese ambitions. He turned over much power to the local council and fled to Australia with a sizable grant from the treasury of Sarawak. He destroyed much of the infrastructure to avoid it falling to the Japanese. At war end, the Australian Army landed and Brooke was back on his family throne. He lacked the funds to rebuild Sarawak so proposed a controversial idea of becoming a British Crown Colony. This was especially controversial because the Rajah was by then mainly ceremonial and the locals had much self rule.

This was also a problem regarding the Rajah succession. Charles had named his nephew Anthony Rajah Muda, prospective. This angered his wife Sylvia of Sarawak who wanted to see the title go to her daughter. This was not allowed by Islamic Law or Charles Brooke’s will but her life saw many schemes to dispute Anthony’s claim to the thrown by pointing out he married a commoner and was disreputable. Anthony in turn opposed Sarawak becoming a crown colony. After the Crown Colony came to pass Anthony Brooke was banned from Sarawak by the colonial administration. A crown governor, Duncan Stewart, was assassinated and there were rumors that Anthony was in on the plot. The assassin, Rosli Dhobi, a teenager, turned out to be an activist who sought Sarawak’s union with Indonesia. Dhobi was hanged. Interesting in modern times the kid’s remains were moved to Sarawak’s Heroes Mausoleum. I guess you can’t just leave the mausoleum empty.

Teenager Rosli Dhobi, center, caught after stabbing to death British Governor Duncan Stewart. The British officer on the right, the throng of fez wearing local soldiers and the two tough Sikh guards give a nice colonial atmosphere don’t they. Well not perhaps for the Governor.

The colony in the 60s was then seceded to a newly independent Malaysia. Malaysia allowed Anthony Brooke to return to Sarawak having renounced his title. Upon his death in 2012, the Malaysian British High Commissioner had released British documents that cleared Anthony Brooke of the assassination. Late in her life in 1969, Charles Vyner Brooke’s widow, Sylvia of Sarawak released a book titled “Queen of the Headhunters.”

Would be post war white Rajah Anthony Brooke as a young man at Eton. How does the song go… the playing fields of Eton have made him positively brave.

Well my drink is empty so I will pour another to toast the Brooke family, The White Rajahs. Come again for another story that can be learned from stamp collecting. First published in 2018.

Malaya was divided into many small Sultanates like Trengganu, on the west coast. These Sultans required protection from bigger powers so paid the bigger power a tribute. Until they fell behind on their payments. 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.

This was the first stamp issue from Trengganu. Before the same Sultan we see was sending his tributes to King Rama of Siam. Or at least, I owe yous. It was the British great innovation to pay the Sultans to shut up and stay out of the way. A system Malaysia has continued.

Todays stamp is issue A1, a 1 Cent stamp issued by the Malayan Sultanate in 1910. This was a 19 stamp issue in various denominations featuring Sultan Zenalabidin. They say his name differently now. According to the Scott catalog, the stamp is worth $2.10 unused.

Trengganu lies on the trade routes so the local Malayans had contact very early on with both Chinese and Arab traders. According to the Sultan, the name comes from when rich hunters from Pahang found a strange fang who they could not identify the animal from which it belonged. So the place was called the land of the fang of something. Chinese traders were a little rougher with their name. They called it the place where children are born who will be slaves. It was the first area of Malaya to become Muslim. In the 19th Century the same line of Sultans as Zenalabidin paid tribute to the Kingdom of Besut Darul Iman. That Empire was not able to cope with the level of piracy that afflicted the neighboring trade routes. As a result, Trengganu transferred it’s allegiance to King Rama of Siam. Zenalabidin took Basut with him with their Kings going into exile.

Siam was in a phase where it was attempting a modernization. They mostly had left the quite foreign Trengganu alone with it’s different language and religion. The Sultan was not prompt however with his annual tribute due to Siam. So when the British approached Siam King Rama about Trengganu, he was willing to make a deal. In return for the Straights Settlements paying the debt owed Siam and an additional loan and expertise to build railways in Siam, Terengganu passed to Britain. Zenalabidin was left in place and the British got along well with him. However when he died his sons failed to impress despite having had British educations. The first son Muhammed Shah II was forced to abdicate in favor of his little brother and the British then felt the need to install an official advisor. This then angered local religious leaders who fomented frequent uprisings. The Japanese occupation saw them try to give Trengganu back to Siam which was by now called Thailand. As the area was not Thai the change did not hold after the war.

Sultan Mohammad Shah II when he was Rajah Muda. Nobody seems to have found him impressive

Trengganu, they have since changed the English spelling, has become one of the most un diverse areas of modern Malaysia and is still heavily rural. Malaysia has a rotational system where the local Sultans become a ceremonial Monarch. When it was the current Sultan of Trengganu’s turn, his wife became the first Malaysian Queen to always wear a hijab.

Well my drink is empty and Trengganu would perhaps not approve of me having another. Come again tomorrow for another story that can be learned from stamp collecting.