Sixpences passed as Half Sovereigns

[bagerap]

It's hard to tell from a scan, but this sixpence has traces of gilding; almost certainly to pass as a half sovereign:



Am I right in thinking that this was a capital offence, or did it merely warrant transportation?



EDIT: Title "1819 sixpence passed as half sov" changed to encompass other years.
Bill.

[UK Decimal +]

Interesting question!   Would it be classed as a defaced silver coin or a counterfeit gold coin?

Looking at the 1816 Act, if it is an underweight gold coin, "... every Person who shall offend herein shall be deemed and adjudged guilty of a Misdemeanor, and shall being thereof convicted by due Course of Law, shall suffer Imprisonment for the Term of Six Calendar Months, and shall find Sureties for his or her good Behaviour for One Year more ..." (continuing with subsequent offences One Year etc., then Two Years for every such subsequent Offence).

Otherwise, it might be covered by clause XVII "... counterfeiting of the same ..." in which case any previous Act not revoked would be treated as "... shall be and continue in full Force and Effect ... with respect to the Silver Coin ... as if the same were repealed and re-enacted in this Act."

As the 1816 Act mentions mainly silver coins and there were probably other Acts or Royal Proclamations involved, it isn't easy to give a definite answer.   That's all the information that I can give at present.   No doubt the same would apply to the 1887 Jubilee-type sixpence and if I can find out anything about that time, I'll add it here.

Bill.

[Figleaf]

Not necessarily an attempt to deceive. Could have been gilded to be used as jewelry.

Demobilisation after the Napoleonic wars brought a large amount of unemployment and misery. Maimed soldiers were often forgotten and reduced to beggars, with pro beggars trying to look like maimed soldiers. Families got into poverty, young fathers into crime, mothers into prostitution just to stay alive. In this climate, laws and punishments were severe. Death penalties were so commonly and unjustly used that they caused revulsion among the public and in the course of time, laws were softened.

Unfortunately, there is no way to tell at which time the gilding took place and whether it was done with criminal intent. Since most, but not all of it was washed away, my guess is that it didn't bother the owner, so the more likely option would be jewelry.

Peter

[villa66]

...Demobilisation after the Napoleonic wars brought a large amount of unemployment and misery. Maimed soldiers were often forgotten and reduced to beggars, with pro beggars trying to look like maimed soldiers. Families got into poverty, young fathers into crime, mothers into prostitution just to stay alive....

But this seems to me to provide additional justification for thinking this might have been gilded to pass as currency.

The coin hasn't been holed for use as jewelry, and I see neither solder nor evidence of the heat required to remove traces of it. But perhaps there is some evidence of jewelry use on the coin's edge, out of view of the photos?

v.

[FosseWay]

For whatever reason, that series of coins (6d--5s, 1816-1820) seems to be particularly heavily counterfeited, so it wouldn't surprise me if other illegal activities surrounded them too. I have numerous counterfeits of all the denominations except the crown, yet hardly any for the whole of the rest of 19th century UK currency. Most of them are copper with remains of some kind of silver wash.

Having said that, the sixpence wouldn't pass that easily as a half-sovereign in this issue. The gold coins of 1816-20 had Pistrucci's George & Dragon on them, and the portrait of George III was also different. The gilding trick would have worked much more certainly with some of Victoria's coins, especially the 'Withdrawn' 6d of 1887, which was withdrawn for precisely this reason.

[Figleaf]

Exactly. The bull head and later series were extensively faked, but with brassy pieces, waiting to be silvered. The reason for these brassy fakes is a loophole in the law that made them legal, as long as they were not silvered. This gave the brass manufacturers of Birmingham the opportunity to do something legal and shoulder petty criminals with all the risk. I have read a story of a forger of this period who silvered such pieces; he wasn't executed, but did spend time in prison. However, that story doesn't apply here and neither does that of the withdrawn 6d, as you said.

It is indeed always possible that someone tried to pass a sixpence for a half-sovereign. Yet, you would expect either a complete gold coating applied by the con-artist, or minute traces of gilding only, the rest wiped off by the victim, trying to minimise the loss. As much more of the gilding remains, it does not seem to have bothered the conscience of the previous owner, so jewelry seems the more likely option.

Peter

[bagerap]

It appears that I must plumb the mysteries of Macro photography to show how much remains of the gilding. It is mainly seen in the depths of the laurel wreath and between the legend and dentils. Had I not spotted it through a microscope, I would easily have taken it for toning.
Macros to come

[villa66]

...the sixpence wouldn't pass that easily as a half-sovereign in this issue. The gold coins of 1816-20 had Pistrucci's George & Dragon on them...

This just isn't true, not where the gold half-sovereigns or the gold half-guineas are concerned, anyway. Both had the usual shield reverses at the time--and would have (at least in the case of the half-sovereign), for some decades.

I note also the portraits are very similar, silver sixpence and gold half-sovereign, faced the same direction according to reign, and that Britons were in a new coinage environment because of the Great Recoinage, where some real uncertainty would have been common--especially where it concerned the gold coins that many folks didn't see every day.

v.

[FosseWay]

Villa -- Now I check in my Seaby I see what you mean. I hadn't realised the half-sov was different from all the other coins in that gold series. But I stand by my comments on the obverse. The portrait is smaller and the legend much bigger than on the sixpence. I'm not saying gilding and passing as 10s is impossible, mind; just that it was probably harder with the 1816-20 issue than later in the century.

On unfamiliar coins -- in 1816 you may be right, but the experience of this country in 1971 and the Eurozone in 2002 suggests that people get used to new money very quickly. I doubt anyone would have been fooled by a forgery in 1975 just because it was the 'new money'. 

[malj1]

'I doubt anyone would have been fooled by a forgery in 1975 just because it was the 'new money'. '

So what about the millions of fake one pounds that abound these days?  ......and who looks closely at their coins today anyway.

Not forgetting that many people would only see one half-sovereign at a time as they were of such high value in those days; they would not have a handful to compare bust size etc. In gaslight a sixpence and a half-sovereign would look the same.

[FosseWay]

Sorry, I didn't express myself very clearly there. I meant that in 1975, or 2006 in the eurozone, people would have been no more than averagely unobservant about fakes. Yes, people always get duped, but it's not down to lack of familiarity with the real thing caused by changes to the latter that happened several years ago. Rather, it's either general ignorance or, more likely, failure to look in the first place. If anything, wholesale changes to the specifications of coins and notes will probably lead to a short term reduction in fakes, as it takes the forgers time to make new ones.

[villa66]

...On unfamiliar coins -- in 1816 you may be right, but the experience of this country in 1971 and the Eurozone in 2002 suggests that people get used to new money very quickly. I doubt anyone would have been fooled by a forgery in 1975 just because it was the 'new money'. 

The cases are very different, I think. But I'm assuming the Britons of 1816 didn't receive anything like the years-long, intensively-illustrated educational programs and saturation publicity that attended the British decimalization of 1971 and the issue of Euro coins in 2002. (I note, for instance, that the British thought it prudent to begin circulating some of the new coins in '68, years before the event, to help familiarize the public with the changeover to come.)

But the real thing to remember—I think—when extrapolating from these events, of the late-20th century British decimalization and early-21st century euro coins on the one hand, to that of the early-19th century British recoinage on the other, is not to forget the problematic coin pair that was included in the latter—the portrait obverse/shield reverse sixpence, and the portrait obverse/shield reverse half-sovereign, both of similar physical size but of radically different face value.

That's one heck of a money-making opportunity that gets plunked down into the confusion—and desperation—that must sometimes have attended the years of the Great Recoinage. Especially when (thanks, malj1, for the excellent detail!) so many of the transactions of those days weren't particularly well-lit.

v.