British, Irish and Scottish Coins

Victoria (1837-1901), 1864 (5), dies 1, 3, 6, 7, 9 (Davies 1064-6; ESC 1713; S 3909) [5]. Extremely fine or better, mostly toned
£250-350

This lot was sold as part of a special collection, Collection of Sixpences formed by the late Alfred Bole.

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In 1863 the post of superintendent of the Coining Department became vacant and the master, Thomas Graham, promoted his brother John to the position, despite the latter’s inexperience. It was John Graham who introduced the practice of numbering the dies for denominations of sixpence and above which passed through the Mint’s Inspection Department. This was a way of enforcing quality control and monitoring the production of the machine operators or ‘press boys’. For a few years all dies of a given annual date and denomination were numbered in strict numerical sequence, but following the death of both Graham brothers during the course of 1869 the system was relaxed somewhat, particularly on the gold coinage (Sommerville, SCMB May 1990, pp.99-101)