Corfù
The island of Corfù, located off the coast of Greece and Albania – the closet point to the boot heal of Italy in the Ionian sea. In 1923, while in Greece at the border of Albania near the coast, an Italian general and a few other Italian officers were attacked and killed. They were meeting with Greek officials to help settle a border dispute with Albania. This incident caused a diplomatic dispute between Italy and Greece. Mussolini and the Italian government demanded an investigation, the execution of the guilty assassins, an apology from the government, and financial restitution.
Since the Greek government would not agree fully to the Italian demands, on August 31, 1923, the Italian navy bombarded Corfù and invaded the island in retaliation. After taking the Corfù, Mussolini said they would remain until their demands were met. Greece tried to get the League of Nations to assist them in getting Italy to evacuate Corfù. However, Italy refused to discuss it with the League. The French government convinced them to meet with the Conference of Ambassadors in Paris to find a resolution. The Greek government agreed to all of Italy’s demands and the Italian military left Corfù on September 27.
Although Italy occuplied Corfù for only about a month, the Italian government took over the Corfù post offices and issued stamps, Italian definitives overprinted with the name of the island – the first set of stamps on this page. The second set of stamps are similar, but with face amounts in lepton and drachma, the local currency. They arrived in Corfù just as they were evacuating. Any envelopes with these stamps on them that were canceled in Corfù are very valuable – although there are many such that are fakes.
Note
This is a new album page. I haven’t found the second set of stamps on this page for sale any where. I’m not sure how much they might cost. It may take a little while to get them.
Also, I still need to create pages for when Italy occupied Corfù again from 1941 to 1943. Those stamps are Greek stamps – forty-six of them, with Italian overprinted text. They were issued for use in Corfù and Paxos.
Contains 14 spots: own 14 – 14 unused, 0 used.
Page is finished.
Album or Web Page Last changed Feb 1, 2025
Stamp Details
The table below lists information about the stamps shown on this page of Lighthouse’s stamp album. For more details about a particular stamp, click on its description. That will take you to the related web page of Colnect.
spot |
own |
catalog |
subject |
description |
comment |
Leoni Design
✓ |
1 |
5c (sep 1923) |
|||
✓ |
2 |
10c (sep 1923) |
|||
✓ |
3 |
15c (sep 1923) |
Michetti Design
✓ |
4 |
20c (sep 1923) |
|||
✓ |
5 |
30c (sep 1923) |
|||
✓ |
6 |
50c (sep 1923) |
|||
✓ |
7 |
60c (sep 1923) |
Cellini Design
✓ |
8 |
1₤ (sep 1923) |
Lepton & Drachma
✓ |
9 |
25Λ. (sep 1923) |
|||
✓ |
12 |
60Λ. (sep 1923) |
|||
✓ |
13 |
70Λ. (sep 1923) |
|||
✓ |
10 |
1.2₯ (sep 1923) |
|||
✓ |
11 |
2.4₯ (sep 1923) |
|||
✓ |
14 |
4.75₯ (sep 1923) |
Footnotes
Spot refers to the postion of the stamp on the album page (e.g., 3.2 indicates row 3, position 2).
Amt. is an abbreviation for the face amount of the stamp.
Own indicates the stamp status: ✓ for unused; ✗ for used or canceled; ⭑ signifies I ordered one; ; ✨ indicates it was bought recently; ✠ means an auction bid is pending; and ◎ is used, and it costs too much for unused.
To search by catalog number, go to the search box and enter it in the catalog number box. However, it’s a bit broken; I need to fix it.
