About the collection: Benbow's stamp collections include twentieth century Bermuda stamps, which are now owned by the Corporation of Hamilton, and stamps of Great Britain. The Bermuda collection, called Bermuda Stamps on Cover & Local Postal Stationary, but commonly referred to as the Benbow Collection, is now in its tenth year of display at the Corporation's offices at City Hall. In 1983, Benbow presented his collection of Bermuda stamps to the Corporation. In the years since, he has continued to take responsibility for adding to the collection and changing the displays at City Hall for visitors and residents to view. The collection includes 16 sections with each section filling eight glass frames. Every three years another section is added to fill eight frames.

"All the stamps are on envelopes and postal stationary - airmail letters, postcards, cards,'' he says. "I collect every stamp issued in a block of four. In time it gives more value and a larger picture to look at.'' Benbow also collected book stamps that were issued in 1948. "They have become quite rare because they never really caught on. People didn't buy them so they stopped producing them.'' The Bermuda collection also includes a section of Boer Prisoners' Mail, Benbow's favourite. "The stamps from the period of the Boer War (1899-1902) are more valuable than the regular Bermuda stamps, probably because the war was a very short incident in Bermuda's lengthening history. And that section, which includes about 60 to 70 envelopes, also makes a very nice display.'' Shortly after he began collecting Bermuda stamps, he also began to collect stamps of Great Britain, and more recently stamps of Helgoland, a small island, only one-and-a-half square miles, located off the coast of Germany which had been British but was in 1890 handed back to Germany. "Collecting becomes addictive,'' he says. "With the Great Britain stamps, I collected every first day cover for a period of 150 years from 1840, bar about two dozen. Then in 1990, I stopped. I got fed up. Now I'm just filling in the gaps.'' The Great Britain collection begins May 6, 1840 with the Penny Black, the first stamp with the Queen's portrait. "There are about three dozen first day covers with the Penny Black that are currently known about.'' More valuable than the Penny Black though is a stamp from 1854, which Benbow had been missing but recently added to his collection. How it started: Benbow began collecting stamps as a boy, but began to take his collection more seriously -- concentrating on Bermuda stamps - before the Second World War, anticipating that mail service was about to come to a virtual standstill, and therefore far fewer stamps would be produced. "People were not writing overseas. So the stamps would have been more valuable from Bermuda. The Government sensibly never overproduced Bermuda stamps. Bermuda and the Falkland Islands have the best stamp appreciation value for this part of the world. They have maintain a discreet conservatism, maybe issuing new stamps three or four time a year, not over doing it,'' he says. "I began collecting Bermuda stamps because they appeared to have value, and then when you start collecting something, it tends to spread. These days you've got to be rigid in what you collect.'' Benbow has increased his collections over the years by acquiring some stamps locally, either by buying them or being given them, while others were bought from stamp dealers overseas. Value: "I don't know the value. Some of the stamps I have are hard to find. I've tried to make my collection as complete as possible, but it's not complete. Unfortunately, I didn't pay any attention to Victoriana.'' Left, envelope posted on the last mailing out of Brishth Heligoland before the island was taken over by Germany on August 9, 1890 and renamed Helgoland.

Below, Upside-down first day cover with a pair of two pence stamps dated March 1, 1854 and marked London.