Hannibal Head Holey Dollar and its consequences
Coins are fun because they can tell you a lot about what was going on in the world at the time. The Hannibal Head Holey Dollar (what a mouthful) is exemplary in that category, because it is... a Spanish coin, with the maybe-image of a French statesman, minted in Peru, and then used as Australia's first coin!
Wow, what a chain of events that lead to that. The first one we'll have to start with is why the French guy is there. He's King Joseph I of Spain, but when you take away the fancy titles, he's Joseph Bonaparte, Napoleon's brother. Joseph, having already done a 2-year stint as King of Naples, was installed as King of Spain in 1808 after France occupied Spain in the Napoleonic Wars.
Joseph was popular in Naples, but the Spanish absolutely hated him. So much, in fact, that it kicked off the Peninsular War where Spain, Portugal, and the UK teamed up to kick the French back out. The Spanish revolt against French rule went poorly for Joseph, who begged Napoleon for permission to abdicate, was refused, then did it anyways and went back to France.
Before that though, the French were trying to establish a feeling of normalcy in their new formerly Spanish-owned colonies. This included Lima, Peru. Peru didn't like Joseph either, and one mint had its own little rebellion by making the ugliest possible portrait for the new coins featuring Joseph.
Supposedly the bust on the coin is an imaginary figure, but it could just be Joseph and they're dodging a lèse-majesté charge. Then they marked the coins still with the name of the once and future King Ferdinand VII. Hence it's called the "Hannibal Head" Reale.
Anyways, you probably know how the story of the Napoleons went, so we'll skip that. But Spanish dollars are still valuable no matter whose face is on them, because they're made of a standardized amount of silver. As mentioned with America, they're popular in colonies to save effort on minting new coins.
The United Kingdom had exactly that problem with their colony at New South Wales, Australia. Having been established 1788 (Botany Bay), the growing economy was running out of physical currency. It's too remote to make anything custom, so a duct tape fix was implemented.
As a one-time solution, the UK dug up 40,000 Spanish silver reales and shipped them to New South Wales, including an unwanted Joseph I coin.
And because they wouldn't receive any more coins for years, the governor had to make sure none of them would leave the colony! So he employed a convicted forger to quickly convert these reales into pence and shillings.
There's one more trick to extending the money supply. The forger would then double the total number of coins by punching out the center! The outer ring would be marked as five shillings, and the center (the "dump") would be restamped at fifteen pence.
There are about 300 known holey dollars from New South Wales, but the one that used to depict Joseph I is the only one known in existence. And considering the convoluted chain of events that put it in Australia in that state, I'm a little impressed there is one at all.
gummygunk
annaxmalina
2087
blakekathryn
kaledo-art
