The Coinages of William Wood.

 

William Wood, an Englishman prominent in iron and copper manufacture, was responsible for two large copper coinages, one Irish and one for the American colonies – although both ultimately wound up in America . There are so many misconceptions and perpetuation of propaganda lies dating from the time that disentanglement is a chore. The following, however, is based on official Royal Mint documents as they appear in “The Mint” (Sir John Craig, 1953).

 

Wood's Irish Coinage.

  By 1720, the copper coinage of Ireland was a mess, no regal pieces having been struck for the island since 1696 and British coinage absent and unusable since the Irish Pound was worth only 92½% sterling. To fill in the gap, all sorts of unregulated brass tokens of the basest sort appeared, to the profit of the issuers. One issuer candidly admitted to circulating counterfeits of his own tokens at 10 : 1 and then refusing to redeem the fakes. He considered this a sharp business practice, not a cheat.

The English parliament (not the Irish) moved King George I to authorize a copper coinage to relieve the Irish situation and this he did by simply giving the right to do so to his mistress, the Duchess of Grafton. In turn, the Duchess quietly put the patent up for auction and it was successfully bid in by William Wood for a reportedly £10,000. His charter was confirmed by Parliament on 22 July, 1722 .

By its terms, Wood was to supply £28,000 Irish in the first year and £5,600 per year for the next thirteen, making a total in all of £100,800. The coins were to be of the best copper, the quality and execution to be supervised by the Royal Mint, and the weight to average 116½-grains per halfpenny. With the British copper halfpenny weighing a typical 150-grains, this was light (it should have weighed about 138-grains). But Wood received just 30d Irish per pound of coins (27¾d sterling), and had to pay £200 per year for Mint supervision, £800 seignorage to the King and even Irish Customs charges – above and beyond the actual costs of the coins' manufacture. Factoring in the secret bribe, he stood to make no more than a fair commercial return.

IRELAND . Halfpenny, 1724. Both farthings and halfpennies were struck dated 1722, 1723 and 1724. For 1722 alone, there was also a reverse type of Hibernia holding a harp left.

 

Minting was authorized in Bristol on 22 August, 1722 and began shortly thereafter. But immediately there were howls of protest from Ireland against the introduction of this coinage, the loudest of all being from the Irish parliament itself. Supposedly a protest against a coinage which they had not authorized (true), the largest secret agenda was due to many of the members being among the chief beneficiaries of the profits on the junk tokens. Throughout the next year or so, Irish public opinion was whipped up to a degree that in March, 1724, the British Privy Council suspended the coinage after something like a total of £50,167 (or about half that authorized) had been struck.

Two “Trials of the Pyx” conducted on Wood's coinage in 1723 and 1724 found them fully up to specifications. Following negotiations, Wood was granted compensation for the cancellation of the patent at the rate of £8000 per year for eight years. He collected it only for the three years until his death.

“Conventional knowledge” is that Wood's coinage was scuttled chiefly through the campaign of scathing letters penned by a Dean, disappointed of a bishopric – Jonathan Swift, the later author of “Gulliver's Travels”. Published anonymously in Irish newspapers under the name “Drapier's Letters”, they were witty, sarcastic and full of untruths. However, the first did not appear until two months after the coinage had already been suspended. Swift did nothing more than ride on the coattails of a protest already won.

Because they passed with difficulty, many of the Wood coins were gathered up and shipped to the American colonies, particularly after 1737 when they were prohibited – along with much worse copper tokens that again flooded in to take their place (to the detriment of Ireland's poor and the enrichment of the issuers). As of 1736, Britain began to supply Ireland with an abundant supply of full-weight (halfpenny about 135-grains) copper halfpennies and farthings.

 

Wood's American Coinage .

 

The “bribe” to the Duchess of Grafton (called Duchess of Kendall in some accounts) apparently also included the right to coin minor coin for the American colonies. A patent to that effect was granted on 12 July 1722 and, according to U.S. references, was for a total amount of three hundred tons of twopence, pence and halfpennies. The total was to be issued over a period of fourteen years but as things turned out, only issues for 1722 and 1723 were struck - although there are a number of “patterns”, many of them probably produced for collectors many decades later.

The dies for the issue were engraved by the London firm of Lammas, Harold & Stanbroke and there is some dispute as to whether they were struck in both Bristol and London or just at the works in Hogg Lane , Seven Dials, London . Craig tells us that they were “struck hot, in a drop press”.

“Rosa Americana” 2d, 1723. The designs were common to all three denominations. (About actual size)

Even though the colonies were forever coin-hungry, the Rosa Americanas carried with them the seeds of their own demise. Because the value of the various currency pounds of the American colonies varied widely, the Rosa Americanas took the least as their standard and were coined at half-weight of English regal coppers, yet (as usual) carrying no mark of denomination. To partially compensate for this lighter weight, they were struck in “Bath Metal”, specified as consisting of 75% copper, 20% zinc and 5% silver .

But so far as the colonists were concerned, these coins were in ordinary brass, “obviously” a cheaper metal than pure copper. Then there was the size (with no denomination expressed): although nominally pieces of twopence, pence and halfpennies, the Americans would receive them only as pennies, halfpennies and farthings – as size indicated. Receivable at the very top only at a “discount” of 50%, there is small wonder new supplies were almost impossible to circulate.

Their brass look aside, they were an attractive coinage, the reverse showing a rose full-face with “Rosa Americana” above and “Utile. Dulci” below (“American Rose / Useful, Pleasant”. The twopence appears undated (1722) or dated 1722 and 1723; both the penny and halfpenny are dated 1722 or 1723.

At “half-face”, these coins circulated in America for years, even to becoming worn flat. They were soon joined by Wood's “ Hibernia ” coppers as well and circulated along with them.

Wayne Jacobs is numismatic expert. He is the award winning author of numerous articles. He is the secretary and editor of the "Mid-Island Coin Club Numismatic Journal"of Nanaimo, Vancouver Island , British Columbia. The MICC journal are hosted here: MICC webpages Copyright 2006 Wayne Jacobs. This article may be reprinted freely for non commercial purpose only if the resource box is left intact, linking back to us.