Hawaii's Grinnell Missionary Stamps

Part III
by Michael Mills

Likewise, they claim, the Grinnells unique cancels could be explained as simply unrecorded devices in the care of, perhaps, the Emersons. But there is nothing to link the Emerson family with the stamps.

Smoking Gun

If the new technologies and forensic techniques uncover circumstantial links between the Grinnells and the Missionaries, the questions turn to whether or not the links are clear and convincing, and rather than being based on “fact” the case of the Grinnells might ultimately be based on “belief” and the faithful accepting the evidence as convincing.

If new documentary evidence appears from an unimpeachable source, authorizing the Hawaiian GPO and/or Emerson to produce additional quantities of stamps as necessary, or if some receipt or text can be construed as showing Emerson in possession of cancel devices and stamps during his time in Wailua or aboard ship in March 1852, that might be convincing.

But consider this tantalizing tangent. The “Honolulu Advertiser” auction had a lot described as: “Printed 1853 receipt of William H. Brown, Collector of Stow, Mass. showing the same printer’s ornaments as used on the Hawaiian Missionaries.” You could imagine countless explanations for that similarity, for or against.

Mr. Kenyon

Another probable explanation for all the bother might well start with the name “Brewster Kenyon.” Hawaiian philatelic expert Fred Gregory makes a strong case that Kenyon may well be the father of the Grinnells.

Gregory stipulates that Kenyon lived in California in the 1890s, authored a treatise on Hawaiian issues in 1895, and had access to real copies of Missionaries held by collectors throughout California.

What’s more, according to the well-known philatelist Varro Tyler, Kenyon was in the market for Missionaries at that time, and was a suspect in a series of precisely faked 1893 Hawaiian overprints. And even though Kenyon’s authoritative report on the Missionaries was referenced at the Grinnell trial, Kenyon wasn’t called upon to testify, though he lived nearby.

Both plaintiff and defendant may have sought to keep Kenyon from the courtroom. If Klemann thought Kenyon was the source of the stamps, Klemann may have feared Kenyon would weaken Klemann’s case, so that Kenyon’s handiwork might escape public scrutiny. And if Grinnell had gotten the stamps from Kenyon, Grinnell may have been afraid Kenyon would claim parentage of the stamps and then under cross-examination testify that Grinnell bought them knowing full well their provenance.

Kenyon was a successful businessman, president of a Long Beach, California land company, and co-founder of the city’s fire department. He died in the ‘40s, but afterwards no one came forward regarding this matter.

George Grinnell claimed that old Mr. Shattuck took the stamps out of a chest, but even this bit of provenance was disputed. Mrs. Shattuck said that only their laundry and her husband’s cigars were kept in the hamper. This and the 1910 fire seems to separate the Shattucks from the stamps, and leaves George Grinnell standing alone with 71 specious stamps.

Perhaps, the storied Grinnells will always exist in limbo. Though the provenance appears to lack a clear and undisputable chain of title, this tale, no matter how it turns out, is a great fireside yarn, bearing the essential themes of great philately.