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● Host Society for the 2011 BANS Congress to be held in Southport
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Society News
The Society’s Oddments Tray!
A cross between a diary and a newspaper, this page features those items of information about the Society and its Members which, we hope, will be of interest to a wider world.
Secret Marks on Merchant Countermarked Silver Coins
Privy Marks as Security
Society Member Eric Hodge is well known for his researches into the series of countermarked
silver coins issued by a number of factories and mills in the years around the end
of the eighteenth and the beginning of the nineteenth centuries, and he has had a
number of articles and updates published in Spink’s Numismatic Circular. His latest
work consists of a well-
The place of the countermarked coins in the currency market was tightly circumscribed: too low a face value and the coins would be melted; too high a face value and they could be profitably counterfeited. To enable the issuers to readily detect counterfeits and thus avoid loss on redemption, secret, or privy, marks were included in the countermarking process. By their nature, these were not obvious and, in the absence of records, can really only be determined by the examination of a number of specimens. Given the rarity of most countermarked pieces, this is not an easy task.
● Read Eric Hodge’s brief guide to
Merchant Countermarked Dollars.
Click here to open the page
The East India Company and its Coins
A New Work
Society member Peter Thompson’s “The East India Company and its Coins” has been published by Token Publishing Limited. An article giving a very brief summary of the subject appeared in the March edition of “Coin News” and the book itself was officially launched at the Harrogate Spring Coin Fair on 26th March 2010.
Until now the coins of the East India Company have been studied piecemeal, region by region, and often lumped together geographically with coins that bear little relation to them. This book brings them all together and tells the story of the coins within the story of the Company itself. In this way it aims to make the whole series more intelligible.
The author’s interest in the Company and its coins was sparked by his lifelong interest in numismatics and the fact that in his early career at sea he sailed the routes from the Bay of Bengal to the East that in the days of the Company would have been called the “country” trades.
The genesis of the book was a talk prepared for and delivered to the Ormskirk & West Lancashire Numismatic Society in 1993 with an improved version in 2000.
OWLNS Celebrates Forty Years!
How we gave the Eagle & Child the price of a pint...
In the years leading up to the decimalisation of our coinage back in 1971, coin collecting was on a tide of popularity; everyone was checking their change for rarities. Sadly, it seems to be part of human nature that we only appreciate something when we’re about to lose it. Such was the popularity of the subject that many coin collecting clubs and numismatic societies sprang up throughout the country. After decimalisation, interest in the change in our pockets began to wane, and many clubs folded. However, one numismatic society went from strength to strength, becoming the premier numismatic society of the North West.
Founded originally as the Ormskirk & District Numismatic Society, in June 1970, the Society soon swallowed up other clubs from Wigan to Bolton and Southport. The name was then changed to the more apt Ormskirk and West Lancashire Numismatic Society. Last week the Society proudly celebrated its fortieth anniversary with a social gathering which included members from a number of other societies and museums.
To mark the occasion a special display of photographs and coins showing the ‘price of a pint’ in the early 20th century was made to the management of the pub where the society meets.
Next year the Ormskirk and West Lancashire Numismatic Society proudly plays host to the Annual Congress of the British Association of Numismatic Societies (BANS) which attracts delegates and speakers from across this country and abroad. The Congress will be held at the nearby seaside town of Southport in March 2011 and full details are posted here on our website. Just click to learn more.
Dr. John Dawson (left), Chairman of the Ormskirk & West Lancashire Numismatic Society, presenting framed photographs and coins to James Kennedy of the Eagle & Child