Norfolk Island: Historical Views - stamp issue out now

Since 2016, Australia Post has issued postage stamps featuring Norfolk Island. This week on 19^th January 2022 a new series of postage stamps was launched which were two stamps with historic artwork of Norfolk Island with an artist impression on Norfolk Island.
John Eyre's charming early 19th-century watercolours feature in the latest stamp issue - one stamp depicting Queenborough (now Longridge), the other Sydney (now Kingston).

The images were of the early British Colonial First Settlement of Norfolk Island, c1804 and c1805. The artist watercolours show the landscape, the clearance of the trees and bush off the land for farming and the early settlement buildings at Kingston and the township first named Sydney.

This week I saw a images on these new postage stamps on Facebook, and Norfolk Island local Maree Evans wrote this comment about the artist.

“Despite John Eyre never visiting Norfolk and the watercolours very likely based on sketches by storekeeper William Neate Chapman, they're lovely (there is also a third painting of the other settlement of Phillipsburg, which is modern day Cascade area)”

It is interesting that artist copies each other’s artworks, and we are fortunate that these images by John Eyre can be shared as a reminder of the landscape

view of Norfolk Island over two hundred years ago.

At the Norfolk Island Museum at Kingston, there are printed images of other early artists as well, William Bradly, George Raper, John Hunter, Thomas Sellar to name a few. These also depict the early days of the British on Norfolk Island, the early landscape and also the flora and fauna. Visit the Museums to see the copies and prints of the artwork.

The new postage stamps details are available online to view and purchase or visit your local Australia Post Shop.

The set has two Norfolk Island historical view postage stamps, the first of the John Eyre watercolour artwork is the $2.20 postage stamp, this image shows a view of Queenborough c1804 and the other postage stamp valued at $1.10, is the view of Sydney c1805.

A First Day Cover with both stamps was issued on 19^th January 2022. these are available for $3.60.

A mini sheet with has both stamps and set with image of the Norfolk Island Landscape. The mini sheets can be purchased for $3.30.

Shop now, while stocks last.
https://auspost.com.au/.../norfolk.../historical-views

First Day Norfolk Island – Historical Views Gummed Stamps Cover

SKU #2147002

$3.60

The first day cover is a pictorial envelope with the two gummed stamps from the Norfolk Island – Historical Views stamp issue affixed and postmarked - First day of issue | 19 January 2022 | Norfolk Island NSW 2899

Envelope size: 190mm x 110mm.

The first day cover is valid for postage only on the day of issue, from the post office named on the postmark.

Set of Norfolk Island – Historical Views Gummed Stamps

SKU #21470671

$3.30

Set of Norfolk Island – Historical Views Gummed Stamps

SKU #21470671

$3.30

This set of stamps contains the two stamps from the Norfolk Island – Historical Views stamp issue.

• $1.10 View of Sydney

• $2.20 View of Queenborough

If you would like to learn more about the history of the artist John Eyre I have included links and a short biography of his life, and also of William Neate Chapman who lived on Norfolk Island and the watercolour artwork by John Eyre is thought to have been inspired by William’s sketchers and artwork of Norfolk Island.

https://adb.anu.edu.au/biography/eyre-john-2034

Eyre, John (1771–?)

by Rex Rienits

This article was published:

• in the Australian Dictionary of Biography, Volume 1 , 1966

• online in 2006

John Eyre (b.1771), convict and artist, was born at Coventry, England, the son of Thomas Eyre, wool-comber and weaver. He was apprenticed to his father in 1784 and became a freeman of the city in August 1792. He is thought to have studied drawing under Joseph Barnes of Coventry. At Coventry Assizes on 23 March 1799 he was sentenced to transportation for seven years for housebreaking, and reached Sydney in the transport Canada in December 1801.

He was granted a conditional pardon on 4 June 1804, and a month later he advertised that he would buy a box of water-colours. The first of his drawings which can be dated accurately were made soon afterwards. Probably in 1807 Eyre combined three charts of Port Dalrymple into one for Governor William Bligh (the original is in the British Museum) but his fee of £4 15s. had still not been paid when Bligh was deposed. About this time he became friendly with David Mann, and provided the drawings for the four engraved views of Sydney which appeared in Mann's The Present Picture of New South Wales (London, 1811). In 1884 the engravings were reproduced in chromolithography by William Dymock of Sydney, and the original drawings are preserved in the Dixson Gallery, Sydney.

For some years Eyre appears to have eked out a fairly precarious living in the colony. In 1811 he was engaged to paint numbers on all buildings on the east side of the Tank Stream at sixpence a time; and in February 1812 he received £12 for painting the constables' staffs of office. By this time he had become associated with Absalom West, an emancipist who was a prosperous brewer. In March 1812 West published two views of Sydney, engraved by Philip Slaeger, also an emancipist, and the originals of these were almost certainly by Eyre. On 15 August 1812 Eyre advertised his intention of leaving the colony. He obviously left a considerable number of his works with West, and the proceeds of these may well have paid for his passage. In January 1813, when West issued a set of twelve views of Sydney, Port Jackson, Botany Bay, Parramatta and Newcastle, no fewer than ten were from originals by Eyre, two engraved by Slaeger and eight by Walter Presston, another convict, who arrived in the Guilford in January 1812. A second series of twelve views was issued in 1814: four were credited to Eyre and two others were probably from his originals.

The records give little clue to Eyre's character. Nothing is known of him after he left Sydney. He was essentially a topographical illustrator, and his work in this field was at times very competent, being drawn with precision and insistence on detail. Examples are to be found in the Mitchell Library and the Dixson Gallery, and in the Nan Kivell Collection, Canberra. The Mitchell Collection includes three signed views of Norfolk Island, but no evidence has been found that Eyre ever visited this place, and one is clearly a copy of a pen and wash drawing made in 1796 by William Neate Chapman.

https://adb.anu.edu.au/biography/chapman-william-neate-1890

Chapman, William Neate (1773–1838)

This article was published:

• in the Australian Dictionary of Biography, Volume 1 , 1966

• online in 2006

View Previous Version

William Neate Chapman (1773?-1838), public servant, was the son of Henry Chapman, a prosperous merchant, and his wife Christina, daughter of another well-to-do merchant, William Neate. Henry Chapman was an old friend of Governor Arthur Phillip, who offered to take the boy with him to New South Wales in the First Fleet. William Chapman was interested in a naval career and his father was anxious for him to go, but his mother thought him too young and successfully opposed the idea; however, she let him go with Lieutenant-Governor Philip Gidley King in 1791 when he was setting out in H.M.S. Gorgon for his command at Norfolk Island. On the voyage William got on extremely well with King and his wife and when he reached Port Jackson on 21 September he found Phillip 'very good to me'. He sailed to Norfolk Island with King next month and on 10 December was appointed a store-keeper there at Phillipsburgh. Although this post was on the far side of the island, visits between Chapman and the Kings were constant. Mrs King, wrote Chapman, treated him as if she were his sister and the lieutenant-governor treated the young man like a father. Chapman was godfather to the Kings' second child, accompanied King to New Zealand in the Britannia in 1793 and gradually became his right-hand man. When King sailed for England in 1796 Chapman found the parting 'very afflicting', though he consoled himself with the assurance that in due course he would see King 'once more in the Colony'.

Chapman's official promotion was not rapid, but by the beginning of 1800 he was acting as deputy-commissary at Norfolk Island, when Z. Clark was on leave. After King succeeded Governor John Hunter at Sydney, Chapman was appointed deputy-commissary there in December, and on 2 April 1801 became secretary to the governor as well. He was allotted a cottage close to Government House and returned to King's family circle. As might be expected he gave the governor loyal support and friendship in the quarrels and troubles that beset him, and played an active part in entertaining Nicolas Baudin and his party when they visited Sydney. In October 1802 he was appointed Naval Officer, but next May became embroiled in a petty quarrel with Captain Colnett of H.M.S. Glatton, over the question whether her papers were in order and she could sail. When Colnett demanded Chapman's trial by court martial, Judge-Advocate Richard Atkins held that no charge was cognizable and, as Colnett refused to bring a civil action, King restored Chapman, whom he had suspended, to his position. A year later he went on leave, sailing in the Calcutta in March 1804, accompanied by King's very warm testimony to his 'long tried honesty and integrity, which sends him home poor and pennyless, except for the savings of his pay'. Unlike most of his contemporaries he had not engaged in trade and, except for running a few sheep at Norfolk Island, which he sold to the government for £158 10s. in 1802, he took no part in agriculture and made no effort to stock or cultivate the 1300 acres (526 ha) of land he held while in the colony.

Chapman never returned to New South Wales, but went first to Madras to engage in trade with Port Jackson and, after six years without success, to Java, which was then under British rule. There he remained as a planter, but when he died on 5 December 1838 he was no better off than when he had first worked on Norfolk Island at a salary of £1 a week.

If you are interested in the history and the beauty of Norfolk Island and would like to purchase a set of these new postage stamps, visit your local Australian Post shop or they can be purchased online.

Betty Matthews

January 2022

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