"I was most interested to find in Bulletin No. 18 pp. 38 and 39 a reference to the stamps of Turks Islands. Regarding the flaw on the Queen's neck: Mr. Hooton Mitchell states that it occurs in all the printings of the 1d. value from the first issue of 1867 to the last in 1889. In the Supplement to the Postage Stamps of the Turks Islands* this flaw was recorded as position No. 24 of the sheet and they stated 'that the flaw was due, probably, to some sharp instrument that was accidentally dropped on the plate at some time or other.' They go on to say: 'We have seen specimens of the stamp with flaw on all printings of the One Penny value of Messrs. Perkins, Bacon & Co. and Messrs. De la Rue & Co. with the sole exception (the italics are the contributor's) of the stamps of the first issue. Whether the flaw was on the plate when it was first used, or the accident occurred to it after the printing of the first stamps was completed, we cannot, at present, say,
In my own collection I have a full sheet of 30 of the 1873/79 issue (Perkins, Bacon); 1881, Setting 10, ½ on 1d. dull red S.G.17 (block of 20): S.G.18 (block of 10) with the flaw showing rather on the faint side for colour, also a block of 9 of S.G.49 (De la Rue) wmk. CC, a mint single S.G.62 and 64 also a sheet of 30 of both, and a sheet of 30 of S.G.63, also a single used on cover of S.G.64; a strip of 5 used on cover in 1899 with the flaw on the second stamp of the strip.
I do not know if Mr. Mitchell is aware of the other flaw on the l/- lilac of the 1873/79 issue (Star wmk.) also recorded in the Supplement by Bacon and Charlton Henry* and mentioned by them as occurring on the ninth stamp of the first row on some sheets of this stamp which is found with a large, coloured blob on the Queen's neck. This flaw is rough oval in shape and, as it is not found on all sheets of the lilac stamps and not at all on sheets of any of the other printings of the One Shilling value, must be due to some foreign substance that adhered for a time to the plate during the printing of the lilac stamps and subsequently became detached. I have also a copy of this flaw on a ½ on l/- lilac which is the only example I have ever seen."
* Supplement to the Postage Stamps of the Turks Islands, by Sir Edward Denny Bacon, K.C.V.O. in collaboration with Major Thomas Charlton Henry, F.R.P.S.L. Stanley Gibbons, London, 1936 pp. 1 and 2.