 |
| Counterfeit Spanish Milled Dollars by Marc Mayhugh from The C4 Newsletter, Spring 2005 Volume 13, No. 1 The Spanish milled dollar, or "piece of eight", was one of the most extensively counterfeited coins of colonial times. This was due largely to its purchasing power, and its popularity as a medium of exchange. The coin was first produced in 1732 with the famous Pillar design, later this design was replaced with the bust of the King of Spain. Made primarily of New World silver, and adhering to the highest standards, the milled dollars were the world's most important coins, the yardstick by which all other coins were measured, and thus subject to counterfeiting. . Contemporary records abound with accounts of counterfeited Spanish dollars. It has been stated that counterfeit eight reales appeared immediately after the establishment of the Spanish - American mints, and reached a zenith in the period of 1790-1820, with the production of countless milled dollars.1 Many times, the counterfeiting resulted in very poorly executed specimans, while at other times, sophisticated pieces that rivaled official production were created. The range of counterfeiting ran from being cast in colonial cellars, to being struck on high speed machinery in Birmingham,England, and covered everything in between. Pradaeu, in his book, Numismatic History of Mexico attests to the diversity of counterfeitng activitites stating, " The source of many spurious eight reales coins can be attributed to the Chinese; to the aborigines of New Spain; to the Spanish adventurers plying the Pacific Ocean between North America and the Orient; a large number originated in Birmingham, England; not a few in Baltimore, and without doubt some in New York City."2 |
| As noted above, there were many different ways to make counterfeit Spanish dollars, some were quite simple and crude, while others were amazingly complex. Pradeau , relying on earlier writers, has best condensed the different processes required to make spurious coins, and he lists the classifications as such: (1) Pieces made of an Alloy of silver and copper or other base metal; (2) A copper sheet veneered on both sides with a thin plate of silver. Then passed through a rolling mill until reduced to the required thickness; subsequently, dollar size discs were then stamped out the strip and provided with an edge; (3) Silver plated disks of tin; (4) Copper cores to which were soldered thinned out obverses and reverses of genuine "pieces of eight" and (5) Authentic coins submitted to strong presure, then cut to regulation size and re-struck, thus resulting in a thinner specimen with 80 to 100 grains of silver less than legal.3 |
| Method (2) appears to be the process used in Birmingham and is one of the most deceptive. This procedure became available with the advent of “Sheffield Plate” developed by Thomas Boulsover in 1742. Boulsover discovered that a 1 inch thick block of copper could be covered by a 1/8 inch coating of silver then hammered and rolled into thin plates. Later, in 1765, both sides could be plated and by 1788 the process was perfected when it was found the edges of the cut plate “could be successfully hidden by the soldering on of silver wire".4 In this fashion the most genuine appearing eight reales could be cheaply manufactured. In a small pamphlet by A, Y. Akerman a counterfeit eight reale is plated which the author claims was a “Counterfeit Spanish Milled dollar having received over a hundred chops and was circulated extensively for some years among the Chinese, who never suspected that it was copper plated with silver"5. |
| An early work by J.R. Riddell's called , Monograph of the Silver Dollar: Good and Bad, differentiates between two types of counterfeit dollars, those struck from dies and those that are cast . Of the cast he notes, a mold is made, "into which some alloy of lead, antimony, tin, zinc &c., analogous to type metal is poured in a melted state." He points out that while these pieces are perfect facsimilies of the genuine, they are much too soft, and light, and can't be made to ring like the genuine, and, "hence are easily detected".6 Most counterfeit eight reales made in the colonies probably fall into this category. It is hard to imagine that the technology existed in the American colonies to produce struck counterfeit Spanish milled dollars, yet Scott's Counterfeiting in Colonial America contains documentary evidence suggesting that this was indeed possible. |
 |
 |
| Click on pictures for enlargement |