"In Case of Emergency": the Return of Sovereign Production after the Second World War

[LawrenceChard]

British Numismatic Society video on YouTube 27th March 2022

An address given by Chris Barker of the Royal Mint Museum:

I listened to the second part of this address live via Zoom on Tuesday 28th June 2022

Worth watching for all interested in sovereigns.

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[Booky586]

Interesting listening and I now understand why we have Greek collectors of Sovereigns.

There's a little about red colour Sovereigns and the royal mint modifying the alloy with silver about 35:30 minutes through, especially for @LawrenceChard

[LawrenceChard]

1 hour ago, Booky586 said:

Interesting listening and I now understand why we have Greek collectors of Sovereigns.

There's a little about red colour Sovereigns and the royal mint modifying the alloy with silver about 35:30 minutes through, especially for @LawrenceChard

Sounds like you watched it in full.

There are many examples of various participants, MOD, RM, BofE, Treasury, etc, sounding quite clueless, indecisive and unwilling. Wasting time debating relatively small matters, deliberately being opaque, worrying about opinions which were probably not important, concealing production, falsifying information and news. Probably acting illegally. A typical lack of strategic, long term thinking from almost all parties involved.

The revelation that in 1948/9, Mint and other officials believed incorrectly that the traditional alloy for gold sovereigns was 22 parts gold and 2 parts copper, the realisation that their new trial production looked much redder than earlier sovereigns, then needing to experiment with additions of amounts of silver, to rediscover what had been forgotten.

What is worse is that this evidence is available, right under the noses of the Royal Mint, yet they are still continuing production of red gold sovereigns, apparently blissfully ignorant of historical facts, and still making and perpetuating the same mistakes, deaf and blind to any input from those who know and realise the error.

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[RDHC]

3 hours ago, LawrenceChard said:

Sounds like you watched it in full.

There are many examples of various participants, MOD, RM, BofE, Treasury, etc, sounding quite clueless, indecisive and unwilling. Wasting time debating relatively small matters, deliberately being opaque, worrying about opinions which were probably not important, concealing production, falsifying information and news. Probably acting illegally. A typical lack of strategic, long term thinking from almost all parties involved.

The revelation that in 1948/9, Mint and other officials believed incorrectly that the traditional alloy for gold sovereigns was 22 parts gold and 2 parts copper, the realisation that their new trial production looked much redder than earlier sovereigns, then needing to experiment with additions of amounts of silver, to rediscover what had been forgotten.

What is worse is that this evidence is available, right under the noses of the Royal Mint, yet they are still continuing production of red gold sovereigns, apparently blissfully ignorant of historical facts, and still making and perpetuating the same mistakes, deaf and blind to any input from those who know and realise the error.

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This is a 'reet champion' post - as they would say in Yorkshire (where some of my ancestors came from). I'm sorry to say that I don't know the Lancs. equivalent. I'm sure that plain speaking is admired either side of the Pennines, and rightly so, too

[LawrenceChard]

13 minutes ago, RDHC said:

This is a 'reet champion' post - as they would say in Yorkshire (where some of my ancestors came from). I'm sorry to say that I don't know the Lancs. equivalent. I'm sure that plain speaking is admired either side of the Pennines, and rightly so, too

Absolutely correct, we would probably say the same thing in Lancashire.

I think "plain speaking" is generally practised on both sides of the Pennines, and possibly in other places occasionally.

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[LawrenceChard]

4 hours ago, Booky586 said:

Interesting listening and I now understand why we have Greek collectors of Sovereigns.

There's a little about red colour Sovereigns and the royal mint modifying the alloy with silver about 35:30 minutes through, especially for @LawrenceChard

It possibly also helps to explain why so many fake sovereigns come from Greece!

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[Oddjob]

Absolutely fascinating...well worth taking the time to listen to this presentation.

[LawrenceChard]

2 hours ago, Oddjob said:

Absolutely fascinating...well worth taking the time to listen to this presentation.

I e-mailed Chris Barker today to ask if there was a transcript, also for his recent talk this week.

I also spelt out at some length that some of his revelations fully supported the case for adding silver, and getting back to sovereigns that look like GOLD sovereigns.

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[GoldDiggerDave]

Good watch, thanks for posting.  l’ve met Chris in person a few times he’s a very good orator on the subject.  

Objects of war is a good read on the subject for anyone who’s interested.

 

 

[LawrenceChard]

17 hours ago, GoldDiggerDave said:

Good watch, thanks for posting.  l’ve met Chris in person a few times he’s a very good orator on the subject.  

Objects of war is a good read on the subject for anyone who’s interested.

 

 

by K.C.

What happened to the Sunshine Band?

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