Elobey, Annobón, and Corisco

Elobey, Annobón, and Corisco was a colonial administration of Spanish Africa, consisting of the island of Annobón, located in the Gulf of Guinea, and the small islands of Elobey Grande, Elobey Chico and Corisco, located in the Bay of the Mitémélé River. Its total area was under 36 km², and the estimated population in 1910 was 2,950 people. The capital was Santa Isabel. The islands are presently part of Equatorial Guinea. Elobey Grande, Elobey Chico and Corisco are now part of the Litoral Province within the Continental Region of Equatorial Guinea, while Annobón constitutes a province in its own right within the Insular Region.

Postage stamps and fiction

Main article: Postage stamps and postal history of Elobey, Annobon, and Corisco

The American author William Styron wrote a short vignette entitled Elobey, Annobón, and Corisco, about his time as a young Marine officer during World War II. His childhood memories of stamp collecting (including stamps from the Guinean islands) are a welcome distraction from the dread and fear he feels when he thinks of the approaching Battle of Okinawa. Although written in 1985, the vignette was not published until 2009, in the collection of Marine-related short stories The Suicide Run (Random House 2009).

References

• Scott catalogue
• Stuart Rossiter & John Flower, The Stamp Atlas