Gold coin worth £250,000 discovered in child's pirate treasure collection

[HelpingHands]

http://www.itv.com/news/2016-10-25/gold-coin-worth-250-000-discovered-in-childs-pirate-treasure-collection/

Gold coin worth £250,000 discovered in child's pirate treasure collection

The coin among the collection Credit: SWNS

An 18th-century gold coin worth up to £250,000 has been discovered in a child’s pirate treasure collection.

The rare Queen Anne Vigo five guinea piece was given to the anonymous owner by his grandfather when he was a child.

The coin was kept in a toy box for pirate games and the owner had no idea of its value.

It was packed away and forgotten about until his grandad died when he rediscovered the coin and gave it to his own son to play with.

Queen Anne Vigo five guinea piece Credit: Bonningtons

Experts then told him it was one of 20 made of gold seized from Spanish treasure ships in Vigo Bay, Spain, in 1702.

The coins, made out of treasure captured by the British fleet, were struck in 1703 as part of a propaganda campaign to detract attention from the British failure at Cadiz the previous year.

The treasure was delivered through London and received at the Royal Mint by then Master of the Mint, Sir Isaac Newton.

My grandad travelled all over the world during his working life and collected many coins from the various countries he had been to. He gave me bags of coins to play with throughout my early years because I was into pirate treasure.

As time passed, these coins went back into bags and boxes and were forgotten about, until I rediscovered them after my grandad passed away.

I looked back through the coins, remembering the stories I made up about them when I was small, and then gave them to my own son to play with and put into his own treasure box. My little boy has been playing with this coin as I did all those years ago.

 

– THE OWNER

The man, of Bishop’s Stortford, Essex, eventually took it to be valued.

Gregory Tong of Boningtons auctioneers, in Chelmsford, instantly recognised its value as one of fewer than 15 known examples.

It is expected to fetch up to £250,000 at auction next month and is only the sixth example of its type to be offered for sale in the last 50 years.

Last updated Tue 25 Oct 2016

[ChrisSilver]

Nice story, thanks for sharing.

Intersting to see what the coin actually sells for.

[sovereignsteve]

It looks in nice enough nick but I wonder if kicking around in a child's toy box has reduced it's value by much?

[fehk2001]

well done grandad / great grandad  hopefully they can fetch more than 250k