October 29th 2022.    

Monday 7th November.

·        Antique Advertising By Ross Farmer.

Monday 5th December.

Monday 9th January (2023)

Meetings are held at the Abbey Baptist Church, Abbey Square, commencing at 7.00 p.m.

 

Notices

·         The annual Christmas Dinner will be arranged for lunchtime on 10th December 2022 at the Bull at Streatley, if enough people let us know they wish to attend. (The Cunning man was already booked.)

·         Please continue thinking about Short Talks for January, and Auction lots for March!

 

October Meeting

Apologies were received from Tony, Peter and Gavin. I gather that Gavin is now on the mend and we hope to see him back soon. John then reported that Michael Dexter-Elisha’s memorial went off well, with a full choral evensong including bell-ringers. A recording of one of Michael’s talks to the club has been sent to the family.

 

We were very fortunate to have Kevin Clancy, Director of the Royal Mint Museum (amongst other things) to talk to us, as the Mint was in the middle of releasing the first coins to have a portrait of Charles III and Kevin had been very heavily involved with the release. He very graciously agreed to answer what questions he could about the process before starting his talk on ‘Objects of War. Currency in a time of Conflict’. He began by discussing the portrait itself, including details of the designer (Martin Jennings) and then moved on to the reverse, well known from the 1953 Crown and intended to connect the two reigns together as the coin is to commemorate the Queen. The 50p will be the first Charles III coin in circulation, due out in December. Sadly, he didn’t have any examples to show us. They are available to order from the Mint now. For comparison, Kevin had checked to see what the first coins issued for the Queen were and it turned out to be shillings and sixpences, round about April 1953, however the very first coin struck was a penny, in September 1952 and sent to the Queen and Prince Phillip in Balmoral. Questions then followed including a current hot topic, the use of ‘Charles’ instead of ‘Carolus’, apparently partly at King Charles suggestion. Kevin also revealed that the number put in to circulation will be driven purely by demand from Banks etc. . Other commemoratives intended for issue this year will continue to have the Queen’s portrait. When the dust has settled on the change, Kevin plans to write a paper on the changeover and we may get him back to tell us all about it!

 

Kevin now moved on to his main talk, based on his 2018 book, which he very kindly left us a copy of for the library. The book is his take on how war has affected coinage through the last five hundred years in Europe and especially Britain. His first slide was an artwork by Justine Smith, who specialises in using banknotes and coins and repurposes them into art. This particular piece is a hand grenade made out of dollar bills. He related a story of how a journalist went out for a beer whilst in a war zone and bought two bottles instead of one, because he judged the price could have gone up before he finished the first. Kevin pointed out the connection between the war in Ukraine and the increase in inflation here in the UK. On the other hand it is possible to think of some good things that have happened due to war, such as scientific advances, great art and poetry. Its not necessarily all negative. The same is true of its effect on currency.

 

Kevin’s book’s reviewer had pointed out that the necessary borrowing that a war produces and the transition from war to peace, if not handled correctly, can lead to disaster and he cited the French revolution, hyperinflation after 1918 in Germany and latterly the wars in Iran and Afghanistan and their effects on the banking crash in 2008. Kevin pointed out that nowadays we tend to count the cost of wars in blood, rather than treasure.

 

An example of an Object of War that Kevin gave, were two pennies that saved a soldier (Pte. I E N Avon), from serious injury by deflecting a bullet. This is not the only example of this type of thing with a German officer in a war with France in the early 17th C saved by a large silver coin, which went on to become a good luck talisman. Another theme was of engraved coins, sentimental keepsakes, with an example from the First World War, though shell cases and other items were treated similarly, some to a very high standard. Kevin also showed a necklace composed of coins collected by a soldier serving in Afghanistan. Some souvenirs were made from stolen items, an example being shown of an ashtray with its base made of a Sudanese coin, supposedly from the Khalif’s treasure house.

 

Another category arises from hoards of coins. One of the most famous of these is of Samuel Pepys, who, expecting an invasion by the Dutch, packed his family off to safety in Brampton with £1300 in gold coins, which were buried in the garden till later in the year when he recovered them. It was not straightforward since his wife and father were unable to remember exactly where they’d buried them. One hoard per year is recorded in the reigns of James I and Charles II and for the first twelve years of Charles I reign. In contrast between 1639 -1649, 189 well documented hoards were recorded, with another 170 or more likely to have come from this decade, which of course corresponds to the English Civil War.

 

Another theme is the idea of weaponising money, an example being Operation Bernhard from World War Two, in which the plan was to flood the UK with fake banknotes and undermine the economy. The banknotes were produced to a very high standard by POWs. An Academy Award winning film (The Counterfeiters 2007) was produced about the plot. It is not a new idea, the British used the idea in the French revolutionary wars and both sides in the American War of Independence.

 

Next, Kevin dealt with the financing of war. In the UK during the First World, there was a run on the Banks. To counter this Britain issued Treasury notes instead of gold (rather than BOE notes which might annoy the Scots). This mirrors closely the events of 1797 when there was a supposed French invasion of Britain on the cards, which also led to a run on the Banks. William Pitt is supposed to have spent an entire night walking up and down trying to find a solution. The problem was made worse by the shortage of silver coinage already present. One part of the solution was the issue of countermarked Spanish dollars, another was to let Matthew Boulton produce the iconic Cartwheel coinage and a third was to allow the Banks to restrict their payments of gold.

 

Yet another theme was the production of siege pieces. These pieces come about when a town has to produce currency whilst unable to get supplies from outside. They can do this by using things such as silver plate. Kevin’s example was from a siege of Vienna in 1529, though we are more familiar with the siege pieces from the Civil War.

 

Perhaps the main way to finance war is by raising taxes and he cited cases of duties being raised on beer, wine and tobacco for the first time in 1643. Both sides in the Civil War were unequivocal that whoever won would remove them (!). A similar thing occurred in 1799 with the introduction of income tax as a temporary measure. He pointed out that the formation of the Bank of England in 1694 meant that Britain became a strong financial centre, having the mechanisms in place for raising taxes and managing debt giving it a greater influence on European affairs and conflicts. The introduction of paper money at the end of the 18th Century was not without detractors and Gillray and others produced satirical cartoons lampooning the Prime Minister, William Pitt.

 

War directly affects the production of coins, for example the multiple mints during the Civil War, supplied with impromptu materials such as silver plate. Other examples include the ransom paid for Richard 1st, which ended up being used to make coinage for Austria, and captured Spanish bullion used for the ‘Vigo’ coins. During the second World War part of the Mint was moved out of London because Tower Hill was too near the docks and so likely to be bombed. The problem affected Lloyds of London, who moved to the Mansion House next to Pinewood Studios and the Bank of England who moved some of its printing capacity to Hampshire. Ultimately this affected other parts of the Nation with the British Museum shipping out some artefacts. The Royal Mint set up a branch mint in Pinewood studios to make lower denomination coins (nickel, brass and bronze) in June 1941. Interestingly Pinewood continued making films during the war, quite often for propaganda purposes, but using the film stars of the time and no doubt the mint workers would have been impressed with the famous actors they would bump into.

 

Kevin then returned to the problems of getting supplies of bullion during wars. One way to solve this was by using debasement of the coinage. We are familiar with Henry VIII debasing the coinage to fund the wars with France, though the French King Jean II was debasing the coinage back in the 1350s. During the first and second World wars many different metals were used on the continent for coinage including iron and zinc.

 

An entirely different area is that of design. Kevin showed a gold Noble of Edward III, which featured a possibly belligerent design of the king on a ship, with a shield and sword, although another interpretation has it as being the Sword of State, it may be a sign of defence or a sign of justice. Likewise a sovereign of Edward VI has different interpretations, with the king holding the symbols of State and dressed in armour perhaps trying to show a military appearance. Other designs have him on horseback, potentially another military representation. Later images of Charles I on horseback reinforce this military idea. Following the execution of Charles I, the Commonwealth coinage is totally different to the foregoing coinage, using shields and removing portraits. This is perhaps a way to say that war has changed things, though in the last couple of years of Cromwell’s life coinage reverted to portraiture, with his family arms on the reverse.

 

Symbolism in coinage design has often included multiple themes both spiritual and worldly, thus an image such as George killing the dragon could be viewed as military victory over a foe or as the eternal battle of good over evil, with George and the dragon being related to the order of the garter and hence chivalric in nature. Another theme is the symbolising of the state as a female image, particularly in the UK with Britannia. Whilst Britannia is holding out an olive branch, she also has a shield and spear, ‘I’m happy to be friends – but don’t mess with me!’. Britannia is capable of war and her image becomes more militarised during the Napoleonic wars. By the time of the coinage designed for Edward VIII, Britannia is shown with a warship in the background. Designs have been deliberately altered during conflicts as propaganda items. Kevin illustrated this with a florin where the Queen’s head has been overstamped with ‘IRA’, similar overstampings with ‘UVF’ occurring on the Irish Free State coins. Symbols on coins can still cause dissent, with the 2014 Kitchener £2 coin generating complaints from people enquiring ‘Why are you depicting a mass murderer on the coinage?’.

 

Ending on a more hopeful note, Kevin pointed to the Euro. For some seventy years, until Ukraine, we have avoided another war between the major powers in Europe, allowing us to change the currency to an almost unified one. Kevin finished with a quote ‘The financial wherewithal to wage war is no less a prerequisite of a Prince or president now, as it has been in the past. For the last five hundred years, that ability has been funded by debt and cementing the link between money, war and Benjamin Franklin’s statement, a timeless observation of 1789 – Nothing is certain, except death and taxes.’ During questions we learnt that soldiers like the SAS are still given sovereigns to get them out of sticky situations and that sovereigns were parachuted into Greece during WWII to help out and as a result, some areas remember the sovereign fondly and quote gold prices in sovereigns rather than currency.

 

Thank you Kevin for a very wide ranging and interesting talk – if you want to know more, remember there is a copy of the book in the library. (All illustrations from Royal Mint ©)

 

Subscriptions

Be reminded that subscriptions are now due. It would be most appreciated if members yet to renew their subscription would please do so at the next meeting. Please see our treasurer Peter Hall. For anyone who does not pay their subs, this issue of the newsletter will be the last they receive.

 

Future Events

·         London Coin Fair – Holiday Inn, Bloomsbury, London –  November 5th.

·         Midland Coin Fair – National Motorcycle Museum –  November 13th.

 

Past Events

Club Secretary.