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Relatives have destroyed/stolen my grandmas stamp collection worth thousands

110 replies

fabmaccawhackythumbsaloft · 11/09/2023 08:28

I'm just posting this as if I don't get this out somewhere and come to ter,s with it I'm going to get ill with the injustice and frustration

Basically my beloved grandma brought me up as one of her own which made an uncle very jealous.

I've also been nc with my mother for over 20 years as she is a spiteful, mean woman with no maternal bone in her body
I have a younger brother who is an addict , now 41, toothless, straggly long hair, wears women's clothing and publicly identified himself on fb as a drug dealer who I'm also nc with

My Nan was a stamp collector from being around 12 years old . Her collection was impressive and carefully cataloged into expensive albums in three categories, new world, Asia and Europe.

By the time she died in 2004 the collection was huge and rare, and worth around 200,000 k

The day after she died my aunt, who is basically like my sister , caught my mother and her brother loading the stamp albums into their cars
She asked what was going on and my mother said we're getting them valued and selling them. My aunt tried to stop them and ,y mother hit her. Finished taking the albums (there were around 150) and drove away

Up until then my aunt had stayed in contact with my mums brother (her step brother) and he backpedaled saying the. COllection was at his for safe keeping . He died a couple of weeks ago so my aunt and her brother (my other uncle who I was brought up with ) asked if ,y cousin (mean uncles dd) could use me as a go between and could she take the collection to me .

Well
She turned up yesterday at my house , we had a lovely catch up and went for lunch. She then said let's empty the albums from the car

What she brought is my nans 'stock books" , basically tatty a4 ring indeed with scraps in. Not a single proper album. I asked her where the actual albums were and she said as far as she knew this was the collection! I said no it isn't , these are her working stock books , and explained there were approx 150 pristine Stanley gibbons albums with entire collections in, and they were categorised into 3 sections, new world, Europe and Asia

She said she didn't know anything about them and that's all she had found at her dad's address

I have cried and cried , not because of the value , but because that was her life's work, her pride and joy , and they've gone and destroyed it, carved it up and sold it.

Oisin turned up in a brand new expensive car, said oh yes dad had 100k just in cash , and he's obviously left her his house too

That cash , that cash I suspect is my nans stamp collection. She had clear instructions for who got what but no will .

It's not the money, it's the way they've piled in like vultures and torn her life's work apart for their own gain and not even considered me, ,y aunt or uncle who were also her children.

My mother hadn't even seen my Nan since the 1980s .

I'm eaten up inside . I'm sat looking at these tatty stock books , and yes her hand writing is in them so I'll keep them although there's 40 stock books and where the hell I'll store them I don't know . Attic probably.

I'm just so sad . Her beautiful stamps are gone .

OP posts:
burnoutbabe · 11/09/2023 18:36

If a will sue clearly say "my stamp collection which is 159 books to x" then it would at least clearly identify an asset which other beneficiaries could trace and demand back.

This would warn off relatives turning up and stealing stuff (not that they did here, everyone knew they had it but didn't bother doing anything at the time)

HowardKirksConscience · 11/09/2023 18:36

No stamp collection is worth that much these days, or even 20 years ago. She’d have needed to have been rich in the first place to acquire valuable stamps. Really rich, and even then, they’ve depreciated. First day covers are worth practically zilch.

Nemesias · 11/09/2023 18:46

Who valued the stamp collection to know it was worth 200k 20 years ago?

LucifersPain · 11/09/2023 19:19

Bizarre that you didn’t ring the polce when they were stolen.

fabmaccawhackythumbsaloft · 11/09/2023 21:12

Thanks for the replies

I've just spoken to aunty and feel a bit better , she basically said I've got to let it go or it will eat away at me

We both said we should have rung police at time but knowing what I know now it would have been classed as a civil matter anyway

I think we who loved Nan were all a bit shell shocked and we'd just also lost our youngest sibling in a horrific car crash weeks earlier so I think we were all just frozen and no one really wanted the confrontation, plus my mother is violent ,

My cousin was upset that no one went to her fathers funeral , it I've said I think the stamps thing did cause a huge rift and no one wanted to know them after that.

It's funny cousin also said she found several wallets of photos, me and my "siblings" I guess he maybe did feel like an outsider as we were so close knit , but doing what he did was never going to heal any rifts

I've also found tonight that some of the stamps had been passed to my Nan by her father who was the one that got her into stamps so some were very old

The collection was huge with some really rare stamps, the Asian ones were particularly beautiful, some were round, some were made with lace

I've told my aunt I'm going to pick some of the pages out of the first day covers that are left and frame them

Thank you for the kind replies .

OP posts:
fabmaccawhackythumbsaloft · 11/09/2023 21:33

Actually the assault part wouldn't have been civil so I wish she had phoned police for that

My mother is one of the nastiest people I have ever had the misfortune to encounter

I do believe in karma , but sometimes it takes a while .

OP posts:
InterFactual · 11/09/2023 22:33

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fabmaccawhackythumbsaloft · 11/09/2023 22:46

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Message deleted by MNHQ. Here's a link to our Talk Guidelines.

Why why why do people have to be such cunts ?

If you don't believe me scroll on

Why would I make it up .? Why put the boot in ? It's absolutely true and i really don't care for,what one idiot poster on the net thinks go away with your malicious nasty petty mindset , go troll hunt so,where else .

OP posts:
fabmaccawhackythumbsaloft · 11/09/2023 23:07

I did have one thought about tipping off the tax office but my aunt said it was below the inheritance tax threshold and we'd never prove it now and she's right

I just need to let it go

I've found so,ethereal local,that frames pictures and I've pulled a few of the first day covers to take

She had the anniversary of the women's right to vote ! Go Nan ! Had no idea she was a feminist 🙂

Also some interesting architectural ones and one for saving York minster from the 70s which is where we were from originally. Some fund raiser .

There's also one for the first Concorde flight

There were 5 or 6 other first day cover albums but there no where to be seen

OP posts:
WhisperingHi · 15/09/2023 08:56

That's so sad. I guess try to see it your nans way, she wouldn't have wanted you to feel sad over her hobby. It gave her focus and enjoyment her whole life, she wouldn't have wanted it to ultimately upset you.

What sad lives your mum and uncle have. Cowards and lowlives. A waste of good air. But what's done is done and they'll never change. At least you had your nan, and she had you. That's what really matters.

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