Week #2016.28 on SébPhilatelie and in Europe

Monday 11 July: European philatelic and postal news.
From my readings of Google News, StampBoards.com, the Commonwealth Stamp Opinion and Norvics blogs, a handful of philatelic and postal news from Western Europe.

Brexit: The current British Home Guard ready to repel the European invasion! (Lonely Planet via The Daily Mail).

How French postal clercks may have jeopardize the British referendum on the European Union by misunderstanding the British postage already paid envelopes, a possible crime of lèse-Prime Minister in the background picture of a commemorative sheet of Jersey, a second Postcrossing issue for Guernsey, the Swiss Post to make gifts to the Swiss people by January 1st 2017, the comeback of Afinsa catalogues of Portugal and colonies (look for Mundifil now), news on Machin stamps' phosphorescence, and how seagulls are a threat against mail carrying.

The SebPhilately Postcrossing Stamp Catalogue was updated accordingly.

Thursday 14 July: Paris-Philex and how philately is the history of Empires and Globalisation.
The seventh article about France Philately Championship at Paris-Philex with some covers illustrating how philately and postal history are linked to the history of colonial empires and the rise of globalisation.

Lettre de Rhodes italienne pour Téhéran en mai 1933 (collection René Maréchal, Paris-Philex 2016).

But, between the conquest of people and their exploitation by big companies, there lies hope of human and sustainable development. And there are old proofs of that: aerophilatelist René Maréchal proposed a collection on the airmail of the Aegean See between 1929 and 1947, when Italy possessed Rhodes and the Dodecane islands.

The cover pictured here was sent from Rhodes on May 1933 to a relative living in Tehran, Persia and working at a school of the Alliance israélite universelle. Four airmail companies of four different countries, allies and ennemies two by two, forwarded the cover to a country where the jewish community is still a recognised minority - despite the difficulties of geopolicy.

Sunday 17 July: Fed up with French politicians.

Again a terrorist attack in France, again a French politician manage to say something... surprising ?

The only stamp I found on this topic: a rocket launcher as one of the weapons of the Cuban Revolution (1965 stamp, series for the Museum of the Révolution., colnet.com).

Henri Guaino regrets that no French soldier with a rocket launcher on his shoulder was present in Nice on the 14th evening... Yes! With a well aimed rocket, the lorry wouldn't have continued his murderous way any longer... And how he dismiss the civilian casualties around the explosion...

I think I begin to be aware of how some people lived the 1930s in France and Britain, watching the dangers growing while their national politicians dismissed them.

Aristides de Sousa Mendes

During my student years in Montpellier, I enjoyed the yearly latter-May "Comédie du livre" (an open-air book show) because there, the éditions Verdier sold their received covers and postcards to finance their coffee breaks. I find this stamp, un-cancelled, on a postcard from Portugal :

This stamp was issue in 1995 for the Europa issue, which topic that year was "Peace and Liberty" to commemorate the 50th birthday of the end of World War 2. The second stamp, 95 escudos too, remembers that Madeira island hosted the British inhabitants of Gibraltar.

On the stamp I found, the character is the Portuguese consul Aristides de Sousa Mendes. Working in Bordeaux during the French 1940 defeat, he violated an order from Portuguese strong leader Salazar : from end December 1939 to end of June 1940, Sousa Mendes signed as many as possible visas to help refugees to go to Portugal through Spain. Arrived in Lisbon, the left part of the stamp shows the families and refugees waiting to embark onboard boats to America. These visas saved Jewish families, antinazis from many political parties, who sometimes already fled Germany in 1933.

The punishment Sousa Mendes' family endured was terrible : they survived only thank to the Lisbon Jewish community's generosity. The consul's children emigrated. And he died in 1954 in the most miserable poverty.

This stamp was issued at a time of rehabilitation of the consul by the democratic Portugal.

To go further:
* biography of Aristides de Sousa Mendes on the Wikipedia in English,
* website-catalogue of the Europa issued.