Largs and District Stamp Club enjoyed a very different evening from their normal displays

Neil Macdonald, one of the club members, gave the display , entitled 'BMA Malaya', and his specialist knowledge and expertise in tracking down the rare stamps and their back story provided a fascinating night for all members.

Neil has been working on these issues for the last seven years and, though there are only 14 values that were actually overprinted for the British Military Administration, this belies the complexity of the issue.

Neil has done considerable work on what happened to Malaysian stamps in the wartime period with printings from London sometimes lost en route or rerouted after the Japanese occupation.

After the war stamp stocks were scattered between Malaya, London, Australia and India. Overprints were applied in different places with different inks, and the perforations, plate sizes, gum and paper types varied with different printings so there are many  variables coming into play.

Neil has produced a spread sheet to bring order into the chaos to enable collectors to make correct identifications.