Call for info re coins of Exeter

[Rob]

I have recently carried out a survey of Exeter & Truro crowns which has thrown up the interesting fact that all bar one of Brettell's Exeter crowns together with most or possibly all of his half crowns have numbers scratched in the obverse fields. Notwithstanding this desecration of the coins, it has also been possible to reference some of the engraved numbers to lots purchased by Simpson at the Morrieson sale in 1933. Simpson's collection was purchased by R P V Brettell in 1955 post-mortem and over 140 coins in Brettell's sale in 1970 came from this source, any or all of which might be similarly engraved. I therefore would ask anybody with coins from the Exeter mint of any period which are in decent grade to examine them and check for numbers scratched in the field as there is just a chance that you may have an ex-Brettell coin and the catalogue was fully illustrated to corroborate the provenance. It looks like Simpson was responsible, but what is done is done and now we can at least make use of the evidence to help establish where the coins were originally acquired. Brettell also had a Dovey Furnace 4d & 3d together with some coins of Bridgnorth(?) as they were assigned to Coombe Martin and Lundy respectively at the time, so you can also check any examples of these that you might have.

Also, anyone having an Exeter crown in their collection - an image of it would be useful as it may be an example I don't have recorded.

Thanks in advance.