Mr T

I know there was a topic on this before but I couldn't find it - so, anyone know of any other examples of an 1872 die letter C farthing coming to light? I haven't seen anything here on in Coin News but I'm not sure where else to check.

I vaguely recall reading a similar theory before so you may be onto something - might have been in one of Michael Gouby's books? I really can't remember now.

I believe the Royal Australian Mint do the right thing - pretty sure all the advertised mintages is what ends up getting produced, and some things are advertised as unlimited mintage (so whatever they can sell within whatever window they give themselves I guess). Also, I had some luck getting images of early 20th century patterns from the Royal Mint Museum recently - it may be worth your while emailing them to see if they have an image of the 2002 Jamaica coins (and if they don't they would hopefully be able to confirm if they have any in their collection).

Nice - not really into decimals myself but always good to see good coin books coming out.

I think I stopped looking after that - the rest of the Cook Islands stuff is keeping me busy though. It was produced by the Royal Australian Mint - I'm sure I could find out how many were produced but I haven't gotten around to it yet. Their record keeping should be pretty good though - just accessing the records is the hard part.

I feel your pain - for a long time I assumed that no 1994-dated Cook Islands coins existed - then one day I saw a set for sale on ebay. Needless to say I didn't hesistate.

Who was Ford?

Worth checking some old Coins News from the time - I'm sure the Australian Coin Review had Royal Mint report summaries in the late 1960s early 1970s.

I suspect not - just as silver nitrate I think stains the skin very easily but silver coins don't stain your hands.

Hm, I hadn't thought about light-sensitivity. Silver something-or-other was used for old photographic film or plates so that makes sense.

Possibly, though I work with a South African fellow and he says that corruption is pretty bad there - someone may have been tempted to make thousands of dollars selling coins that no one really knew about.

I somehow doubt a reclamation rate of 90% too - from memory the British West African withdrawal rate was around 90% for two shillings coins (the highest rate for any denomination). I suppose some of the survivors would be too worn to identify (probably not a whole lot though - 60 years of circulation has left plenty of half-decent coins) and I suppose a fair few would have been sent overseas. I'm sure plenty of British pennies ended up in Australia and New Zealand at least and I think the average collector here in Australia isn't too bothered with Freeman numbers.

A different die do you think? Do you know around what year(s) these coins were sourced? If there were no provenances possibly they were sold off by corrupt officials or whatever.

I'm sure the mint would have figure - possibly in old coin magazines of the day? Certainly in their annual reports. There are pretty accurate figures for pre-1937 coinage withdrawal in British West Africa in Vice's book.

What are the other differences? Agreed! It is often mentioned as the source of those 1924 proof sets with the 1922 penny but I can't find a source to back that up. https://coins.ha.com/itm/great-britain/great-britain-george-v-satin-finish-specimen-set-1924-and-1922-not-listed-in-the-spink-guide-but-well-known-these-are/a/340-15206.s mentions an old collection from South Africa but that's a little vague.

Yes I figured half sovereigns got less love in general. It's definitely not a die fill though - the size of the design has changed as well.

No love for 20th century half sovereigns I guess?

Any that aren't listed in Davies?

Nice design. Didn't realise just how much craft went into unofficial stuff like this before I saw this thread.

Do reverse A/no B.P. 1904 half sovereigns exist? I haven't seen one but haven't been to track many images of 1904 half sovereigns to check. Marsh says that they do but he said that reverse B/B.P. 1904P half sovereigns exist and I've looked at a few and I think they probably don't (and it is listed as unverified in the local Australian catalogue).

What does the book say about wreath crowns?

They're both 156 denticles - Davies makes the note that the length of the denticles varies from year to year as well.

I think the R in BRITT is slightly rotated on obverse 12. But halfpenny obverses 11 and 12 are probably the worst to try and differentiate.

I think the book I remember considered only comparatively modern events - my history isn't great but a small number of British soldiers may have snuck into Sweden at some point in World War II (or maybe it was Norway)?

Is there a better way to pick these than the flat/curved-base letters? https://www.drakesterling.com/catalog/product/view/id/128122/s/1893-half-crown-2/category/54/ looks like a reverse A. https://onlinecoin.club/Coins/Country/United_Kingdom/Halfcrown_1893/ looks like a reverse B, as does https://collections.museumvictoria.com.au/items/70926 At a glance they look roughly the same, denticle alignment-wise - I didn't count but will if there's no other obvious distinguishing difference.