Abacus Auctions

Mail used to be a useful source of income and easy pickings for 19^th century Australian bushrangers who regularly held up and robbed the famed Cobb & Co coaches that provided vital communication links between Australia’s major cities and regional towns.

Many of the registered letters contained banknotes and, once opened, the envelopes were then tossed aside.

Former Australian fast bowler Jason “Dizzy” Gillespie loved being part of a successful Test and one-day cricket side.

“The highlight of my career was winning Tests and World Series matches and contributing to the victories by bowling well,” he explained.

The first Aboriginal male to become a Test cricketer and the only nightwatchman to score a record 201 not out (against Bangladesh in 2006), Gillespie began both his Test and one-day career in 1996, aged 21.

A prized complete set of proclamation coins – inextricably linked to the development of Australia’s domestic currency system– is a major feature and first time offering of Melbourne-based Abacus Auctions forthcoming four-day sale of stamps, coins, banknotes, postal history and sporting memorabilia from 10am Tuesday March 25 to Friday March 28 at 29 Hardner Road, Mount Waverley.

Who would have ever thought that Australia’s leading expert on body language and a key advisor on the subject to police forces, customs officials and similar authorities would attract auction goers to his activities.

Well Allan Pease is a man of many hats and, in addition to his somewhat unusual profession, is a keen of collector of Australian convict history.

The phrase “necessity is the mother of invention” was never more apt than during World War II when a British army captain captured by the Japanese and interned at a prisoner-of-war camp in Thailand sent a secret message cleverly squeezed between two layers of a postcard to his wife back home.

On September 9, 1943, Captain Phil Rogers inscribed a 133-word message in micro-writing on tissue paper, which he then secreted between the postcard layers, alerting his wife to his fate.

The rarest Don Bradman cricket cigarette and trade card in existence (lot 3627) is being auctioned through Melbourne-based Abacus Auctions at its forthcoming four-day stamps, postal history, militaria, coins and banknotes and sporting memorabilia sale from 11am Tuesday May 21, continuing each day at the same time until Friday May 24.

The card, issued in 1932 by the Friends Temperance Union, is one of only six or seven known examples worldwide.

It was indeed momentous. Australia claiming its first naval victory as HMAS Sydney destroyed the German raider SMS Emden not long after the start of World War I.

The date was November 9, 1914 and, over a two-month period, the German cruiser had wreaked havoc with Allied shipping – sinking or capturing 25 steamers, a Russian cruiser and French destroyer.

An impressive postal history collection up for auction in Melbourne inextricably links the former Australian penal colony of Norfolk Island and Pitcairn Island, home to survivors of the infamous 1789 mutiny on the British ship HMAV Bounty and their descendants.

Under the leadership of acting lieutenant Fletcher Christian, the mutineers had commandeered the ship from Captain William Bligh who, with several of his loyal crew, managed to sail the small boat they were set adrift in to Indonesia. Bligh later became an early Governor of New South Wales.

The name Gary Fenton (1946-2023) will live on in Australian broadcasting history as the driving force behind the worldwide coverage of the Sydney 2000 Olympic Games.

Head of sport in turn at Channels 7 and 9, his influence at both television stations was profound.

His efforts in securing Channel 9 the Australian rights to the 2010 Vancouver Winter Olympics and wresting coverage of the 2012 London summer games from the incumbent Channel 7 via an audacious joint bid with Foxtel are still talked about today.

After he retired, legendary left-arm Australian fast bowler Alan Davidson (1929-2021) used to amuse guests at Sydney Cricket Ground official lunches by using round bread rolls to demonstrate how to hold a cricket ball to bowl an inswinger.

In fact, it became such an obsession that staff started substituting the elongated variety to counteract him.