Watch List notes:

Griquatown 5 Pence ND (1815-16), KM-Tn4, Missionary Series silver token, AU55 NGC, well preserved: considerable luster, light silvery golden gray toning, slight wear mostly noted on the breast of the flying dove, sharp strike with the dove's eye and wing feathers bold, rims consisting of long denticles well defined on each side, surfaces remarkably unblemished and pleasing to the eye. Among the best preserved of these rarities. Denomination of 5 (Pence) appears on reverse as five simple roman numeral I digits. Brian Hern states that these pieces, of various values, were used briefly by the Griqua people, suggesting that this money came out of the mission site which was abandoned about 1816. He points out, importantly, that these tokens were the first money specifically minted for, and used by, a South African people. It is not known if they were called "pence" in their day or called by another local name, as there is no use of anything but digits and fractions on any of them. They were made in England (mint location unknown) on contract for the Missionary Society (founded in 1794), which was renamed the London Missionary Society in 1818; this organization sponsored Christian missionaries all over the British Empire. In Africa, in later years (the 1870s), its most famous missionary was the explorer David Livingston. Not a great deal of knowledge exists about these curious coins. It is known that they were shipped to the colony during the years 1815 and 1816 but mintage figures are not known; the LMS finally gained a strong position as a missionary organization in South Africa in 1822, but the majority of these struck tokens perished shortly before then, by being smelted locally. Survivors have come down to modern collectors merely by accident. The flying dove bearing the symbol of peace was the society's emblem, an image that was resurrected in the 1880s and 1890s when the "Victorian" bronze pennies came into being. This is an important coin, or token of money, for any serious South African collector.

Estimate: 5000.00-6000.00 USD