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12 hours ago, Peckris 2 said:

Apparently France converted from copper to bronze from 1848.

Here's an extract from G. Thullier (Pour une histoire monétaire de la France au XIXe siècle).

From what I can understand with my poor French:

Straight after the Revolution of 1848 and on 3/May of that year they were still striking Centimes in pure copper. 

It seems that the big push in France toward Bronze came a little later on 6/May 1852 with an issue of 48,500,OOOF of bronze (at that time they also recalled about 10,000T of copper). Notably, he states that bronze coins were circulating 50 years earlier than that (Note1 states that in 1848 there was already various (billon) coinage in circulation made of copper or bell metal or bronze which was made half a century earlier,  which I assume was official issue).  

544850949_Screenshot2021-05-22at10_50_03.thumb.jpeg.e2dc16d25ed019a17dd69440b21608d0.jpeg

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48 minutes ago, blakeyboy said:

...then why not just write the totals in a pocketbook?

Why scratch a coin as a tally?

That's a very fair question, and one which wasn't addressed by Gouby in his 1860 to 1869 book. I presume the numbered coins were at the very top of a visible batch (however they were stored/packed), as an indicative for inspection. Then a separate note was indeed made in a pocketbook by an Inspector. 

As to why they were kept, there is actually no definitive answer. Presumably as some form of quantity/weight marker. Though whether that was overall, or connected with certain dies, is a mystery.  

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13 minutes ago, 1949threepence said:

That's a very fair question, and one which wasn't addressed by Gouby in his 1860 to 1869 book. I presume the numbered coins were at the very top of a visible batch (however they were stored/packed), as an indicative for inspection. Then a separate note was indeed made in a pocketbook by an Inspector. 

As to why they were kept, there is actually no definitive answer. Presumably as some form of quantity/weight marker. Though whether that was overall, or connected with certain dies, is a mystery.  

All of this is speculation, so the best I can come up with is monitoring individual design variations rather than specific dies.

We do know the numbering started more or less immediately, which suggests a need to monitor something. Tonnage and mintage figures would have been documented as a matter of course, after all, converting metal to coins is their primary function, and every business will track and account for materials through to output - that's your 'notebook'. With plenty of gold and silver passing through, which was definitely accounted for via the pyx, it's inconceivable that copper or bronze input and output was treated differently. They had to buy copper (i.e. order specific quantities from suppliers) in order to make coins which were specifically ordered by quantity by the banks. There's no way the place could function without accountability.

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On 5/22/2021 at 10:56 AM, Rob said:

. With plenty of gold and silver passing through, which was definitely accounted for via the pyx, it's inconceivable that copper or bronze input and output was treated differently. They had to buy copper (i.e. order specific quantities from suppliers) in order to make coins which were specifically ordered by quantity by the banks. There's no way the place could function without accountability.

I would imagine a lot of the mints silver , gold and copper would come from pulling worn older coinage from circulation  , back then I think banks reluctantly did it as a service to their betters in the BOE.

After all we all know there comes a time when a coin gets so worn or damaged  it will not be accepted , these cruds have to be taken out of circulation some time .

Remember the state of some bun pennies in the late sixties - worn smooth they were

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On 5/21/2021 at 12:26 PM, Chingford said:

The 1860 Halfpenny Obv die was used for Isle of Man coinage.

Which IOM coinage please John? The only fit I can see is the 1860 copper halfpenny and the 1839 IOM halfpenny and I'm struggling to get my head round that. :wacko:

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27 minutes ago, mrbadexample said:

Which IOM coinage please John? The only fit I can see is the 1860 copper halfpenny and the 1839 IOM halfpenny and I'm struggling to get my head round that. :wacko:

I was giving an example of low mintage UK coins where the dies were used to produce other Commonwealth/Countries coinage. This could be part of the reason why some coins are relatively few in number.

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I think they DID go into circulation if the mintage figure is correct as if not you would find more in high grade ,more than we see would of been kept or put away.

If they did enter circulation then the mintage being so low ,they have been lost ,scrapped or are in collections in different grades like any other year.

30,000 is nothing and not many people even in 1860 would of even seen one ,however its a high mintage for a non circulation coin.

Possibly the 1859 die was used for the 1860 ,rather than just thrown away , just to add a few more as it was already worn (1859 ) and the bronze die being made.

Edited by PWA 1967
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On the subject of 1860 Copper penny ,i know i dealer who has just got one for sale that i believe is really nice with lustre ,although i have not seen it in hand.

It is not available on a website or list yet ,but if anyone is interested please PM me and will pass on the details.

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A couple of undescribed decent pennies - 1860 missing colon dots and 1861 F25 have just been withdrawn from Ebay. It will be interesting to see if they reappear.

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5 hours ago, Iannich48 said:

I was looking at 1861 pennies the other day, i must have missed the f25.

It wasn't listed as an F-25...

I missed seeing the missing colon dots though...

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10 hours ago, secret santa said:

A couple of undescribed decent pennies - 1860 missing colon dots and 1861 F25 have just been withdrawn from Ebay. It will be interesting to see if they reappear.

The vendor assures me they will, he had turned down substantial offers apparently. He intends to “properly describe’ them.

Jerry

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10 hours ago, secret santa said:

A couple of undescribed decent pennies - 1860 missing colon dots and 1861 F25 have just been withdrawn from Ebay. It will be interesting to see if they reappear.

What sort of grade was the F25, Richard?

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Couple of newbies .Been after a decent 1904 for a while (at a fair price ). And picked up a low grade 1909 ON'E Penny .I saw it when I bought my better one , and it was still unsold 2 weeks later (so I decided to add it to the pile) .

 

1904 Penny F159 rev .jpg

 

1909 Penny ON'E error (2) rev .jpg

1909 Penny ON'E error (2) obv .jpg

1904 Penny F159 obv .jpg

Edited by mick1271
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Nice find!

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3 hours ago, terrysoldpennies said:

My latest addition an  F176  2+a  in top grade 

1571378921_19132-Af176Exrarebestcoin1low.thumb.JPG.7411a22fafd9e61d833258a9c3ebbc28.JPG

Yep, well done Terry. Beauty.

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On 5/22/2021 at 1:02 AM, Peckris 2 said:

Ah, but they managed fine from 1861 - 63!

A lot of it was outsourced to Watt and Heaton.

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On 5/22/2021 at 9:17 AM, Rob said:

The question of the numbered strikings was addressed by Graham Dyer, former curator at the RM Museum in a 1982 article entitled 'Numbered Strikings of Victorian Bronze Coins, 1860-1868'. Whilst people are unlikely to have this, the important points are laid out in Michael Gouby's 2000 publication 'The British Bronze Coinage, Pence, Halfpence and Farthings 1860-1869' whereby Dyer has shown the improper fractions seen on a few coins relate to the total tonnage of bronze to that point (larger number) and the tonnage of that denomination (smaller number). As the BM has an example of an 1864 farthing with 236/11 (P1872) and there is a penny with 237/134 (P1662), using the consecutive numbers as a total for bronze output in tons, we can deduce the tonnage of halfpennies to that point, as after 236 tons of bronze struck there had been 11 tons of farthings and (using 237/134 as a reference point) 133 tons of pennies. ie, the remainder is 92 tons of halfpennies. 

Further to the above, the introduction to the publication gives a little history, including some useful snippets, summarised as follows:

Victoria was only happy with the portrait at the beginning of August 1860.

The mint was very busy at this time with gold and silver and didn't have the resources to produce the number of coins required for the changeover. Consequently they gave Watt a contract for 1720 tons (including all three denominations) in the first week of Sept. Production was underway at the Tower mint by the end of the month. On the 15th October, daily output of halfpennies and farthings was just over 150K - 50K short of the 200K target. The deficiency was due to too many dies breaking, with an average of 30000 strikes obtained instead of the usual average of 60000. There was a need to reduce the relief on all three denominations at this point. The farthing was done, the halfpenny was 'very nearly ready', but the pennies required a further alteration, so at this point were still not in production. Nor had Watt started production by the end of November. The beaded border created a problem, with flaws appearing in this area regularly.

Taking the above into consideration, it is hardly surprising there are fewer pennies extant than the other denominations for 1860. 

Given the delay in getting the bronze coinage started, I would have thought they prepared 1860 dies for all three denominations. 1859 halfpennies and farthings are both scarce, and the halfpennies I have had of this date were all struck from old worn dies, whether 9 over 8 or not. So it is likely they intended to strike a good number of the smaller denominations in any case. As John pointed out, the halfpenny obverse was certainly used commercially. 

It is beyond debate that they intended to change over to thinner, harder bronze coins earlier than they did, but as the decimal patterns of 1857-9 show, the bronze flans were prone to lamination. See below for the F689 edge. All 686s have this problem too. As these are both dated 1859, it is clear the problem was ongoing. Both are struck in bronze with a thickness of 1.5mm and are 27.5mm diameter. Freeman analysed the similar F686A to have 92.5% copper, 5% nickel, 2 % tin and 0.5% zinc, but this variation in alloy didn't cure the problem.

For those unaware of what the numbered coins refer to, please see attached 1866 halfpenny showing 405 behind the head and 138 in front, i.e. 405/138. 

F689 edge.jpg

img608.jpg

Where was it published? British Numismatic Journal?

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1901 with the second one in the date directly over the tooth .  Blakeyboys newly discovered type , now listed by Gouby as type Ac 

237561817_1901last1indatedirectlyovertoothExcrarefinestknownexampleGoubyActerrys.thumb.JPG.b598677d3c39a67b25e1bc15e79f4866.JPG

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Neat discovery Blake.  

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3 hours ago, terrysoldpennies said:

1901 with the second one in the date directly over the tooth .  Blakeyboys newly discovered type , now listed by Gouby as type Ac 

237561817_1901last1indatedirectlyovertoothExcrarefinestknownexampleGoubyActerrys.thumb.JPG.b598677d3c39a67b25e1bc15e79f4866.JPG

It seems to have a wider rim than usual?

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