As wages and prices rose during the Industrial Revolution, small silver coins became scarce. The last major Royal issue was in 1758 and countermarked Spanish dollars and Bank of England tokens could not meet the increasing need for small silver coins. Private banks,factory owners,private traders and workhouses began issuing 6 pence and shilling tokens in 1811- at a profit. An average shilling token might contain 10 pence worth of silver at a face value of 12 pence.They were declared illegal in 1813, sending many issuers into bankruptcy as their tokens were presented for redemption. These tokens are all scarce to rare and are often found harshly cleaned or heavily tarnished. A decent example sells for $35-50 and a choice original token in near uncirculated or better condition may command $100-200.
The Seaby books listed on my 17th century page are useful for this series also.The standard reference is THE SILVER TOKEN COINAGE 1811-1812 by Dalton. It is out of print but an excellent book- TOKENS OF THOSE TRYING TIMES by Mays is in print and includes the Dalton book as an appendix! It is not readily available in the US, but order it from Spink The problem with this series is finding nice tokens for sale.Any of the dealers listed on this website may have a few available at any given time.
