About The Museum
The Mauritius Postal Museum has three permanent galleries. The first gallery
sheds light on the postal history of Mauritius. It presents stamps from the
colonial period 1847- 1967 and Mauritian stamps issued between 1968 and 1995.
The colonial issues include the locally printed classics, the Britannias (1858
-1862) and the Victorians (1860 - 1893) etc. Photographs of old post offices and
mail vehicles are exhibited on the walls. This gallery also houses the Sales
Counter/Gift Shop, which offers for sale to the visitor philatelic accessories:
stock books, stamp albums, mounts and tweezers; postage stamps; first day
covers; and souvenir items. Special arrangements can be made here for servicing
covers. Letters posted at the museum are cancelled with special cachets.
The second room has on display philatelic paraphernalia dating back to the mid
19th century. The exhibits comprise scales, Clocks, post boxes, letter boxes,
automatic franking machine, Telegraph Equipment, old office furniture and
postage stamp vending machine, all used in the Post and Telegraph Department.
One display unit contains Stamps Cancelling Devices, datestamps, rubber and
metal handstamps, badges, insignias and uniform buttons. Several printing plates
are affixed to one wall.
In the third gallery are found non-Mauritian stamps. Those in the wall-mounted
showcases are grouped under various themes: Locomotives, Ships, Wildlife etc.
Weights in use before the closure of the Mauritius Railways, an Old Scale
(1854), Perfin Devices and office equipment, Ink Pen, inkpot and postal items
retrieved from a postal agency at Cluny are exhibited in a wall unit.
In front of the museum building, two Pillar boxes manufactured in 1861 by
Cochrane & Co., Woodside Works Dudley, England has been placed. Pillar boxes
were later on made at the Railway Workshop, Plaine Lauzun. The Postal Services
were closely associated with the Mauritius Railways which transported the mail
to different regions in Mauritius.
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