160 YEARS ABOLITION OF SLAVERY IN CURACAO 1863-2023

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160 Years Abolition of Slavery 1863-2023

Curacao post International is proud to present this emission of six stamps dedicated to the 160 years abolition of slavery. The first stamp left of the top row of 250c has the plantation house “Knip” on it in the background. Here is the place where the slave revolt in Curaçao started in 1795. Also enslaved women were battling for freedom. The middle stamp 350c on the top row has the fist of the fight for freedom and a chain with an open shackle. This was designed by Yubi Kirindongo and is placed on 7 key locations of the fight for freedom that took place in Curaçao in 1795. The right stamp on the top row 450c has the portrait of an Afro-Caribbean woman who expresses strength, beauty, dignity and grace. The kibrahacha flowers gracing her, reflect bright, beauty and strength as these trees can survive without water for long periods of time.

The left stamp 550c of the bottom row is about the Trans-Atlantic slave trade and the Dutch WIC (West Indian Company) who traded in enslaved people from African countries to the Americas. The middle stamp of the bottom row 650c has a slave ship in the back, the national monument Desenkadená (‘Unshackled’) made by Nel Simon. In the center Tula and a man and a woman at his side representing all the other male and female freedom fighters of 1795. To complete this stamp series there is the stamp right below 750c which has 4 men who fought for freedom from their oppressors: Camille Desmoulins who was one of the key figures in the beginning of the French revolution in 1789, Toussaint L’Ouverture who fought for the cause of Saint Domingue (Haïti) in 1793, afterwards Tula for Curaçao in 1795 and that same year in Coro, Falcón, Venezuela one of the freedom fighters was the then so-called sambo (mix of African and indigenous) José Leonardo Chirino. The movement for abolition of slavery started with the motto ‘Liberté, Égalité, Fraternité’, meaning Freedom, Equality, Fraternity. Cpost International would like to extend its gratitude to Mrs. Avantia Damberg for the tremendous work she has done as the designer of this commemorative stamp.
https://www.wopa-plus.com/en/stamps/product/&pgid=82833
VOC and WIC ships type used in that time. The stamp shows a three mast ship, most probably an East Indiaman in Dutch given as, “Spiegel return schip”
This ship type was most commonly used by the VOC and WIC,
The spiegel return schip, also known as a return ship, is the type of ship most often used by the Vereenigde Oost-Indische Compagnie (VOC) on the Atlantic trade to the Dutch East Indies. The West India Company (WIC) and the British East India Company also used this type of ship or similar variants.
In addition to the Spiegel return ship, the VOC also used other, often smaller ship models, such as the “hoeker”, the “galjoot”, “yacht”, the “pineace” and the “fleute”.
Naming and characteristics of the “spiegelschip”
The name mirror ship (“spiegelschip”) comes from the typical upper transom and lower transom at the rear (the stern) of this ship. These 'mirrors' were flat or nearly flat surfaces at the stern of the vessel. This richly decorated part of the ship was reminiscent of a hand mirror. The transom return schip was a three-master and between 36 and 48 meters long. It took shipbuilders about five to eight months to built one return ship. Costs: NLG 100,000 guilders. The result was a freighter that could navigate the ocean and last an average of fifteen years. Return ships had a loading capacity of no less than 800 tons.

Why was this ship called a (mirror) return ship?
A transom return ship or return ship always made - unless the ship was wrecked - an outward journey and a return journey. Hence the term 'return'. Well-known return ships of the VOC were the BATAVIA, the AMSTERDAM (which was lost during its first voyage in 1749), GELDERMALSEN and PRINS WILLEM.
From the year of the foundation of the VOC, 1602, to the year 1700, an estimated 317,000 people – of international origin – sailed on VOC vessels. In the period 1700-1795 there were about 655,000 sailors. Of these, about one in three sailors returned. Some of them continued to live in the Dutch East Indies. Diseases (such as scurvy), epidemics, shipping disasters and combat actions killed an estimated 5 to 10 percent of all crew members on the outward or return journey.

https://historiek.net/spiegelretourschi ... 0varianten.
Curacao 2023 sheet 2.50/7.50c sg?, Scott?