East India Company, Bengal Presidency, European Minting, Soho, hexagonal copper Pattern Gund...

The first serious attempt to replace the cowrie shell in Bengal – a fascinating currency experiment East India Company, Bengal Presidency, European Minting, Soho, hexagonal copper Pattern Gundah or Four Cowries, 1792, unsigned [by N.-A. Ponthon], large size, balemark, rev. scales, ‘adil [justice] below, edge plain, 15mm, 1.48g/6h (Prid. 365 [Sale, lot 684]; Stevens 10.1; KM. Pn11). Good extremely fine with a hint of original colour and proof-like fields, very rare [certified and graded NGC PF 63 BN] £1,500-£2,000 --- Provenance: P. Snartt (Bristol, UK) Collection SNC (London) April 1980 (3158), ticket. Owner’s ticket and envelope. In contrast to the Madras and Bombay presidencies, Matthew Boulton’s Soho manufactory only produced pattern coins for Bengal. Robert Wissett (1750-1820), a senior Company figure in London, contacted Matthew Boulton in September 1792 with a view to Boulton producing a coinage to supersede the cowrie system, rated at 1,280 to the rupee. Boulton conceived the idea of making hexagonal pieces and, within 10 days of Wissett’s initial contact, he had been sent 50 specimens of the larger-size coin, but owing to a misunderstanding coined them to the value of four cowries instead of one. Smaller pieces were made, but whether pieces of either size were actually shown to the new Governor-General of Bengal, Sir John Shore (1751-1834), before his departure for the East, is not known. As David Vice stated in his article on the series (Format FPL 58, pp.2-5), ‘the passage of time and the propensity for these very small pieces to easily get lost have contributed to the serious erosion of these numbers [i.e. the numbers of pieces struck]. Consequently only a handful of examples has survived to bear testimony to what was for the East India Company a fascinating currency experiment, and for Matthew Boulton a marvellous display of his ingenuity and entrepreneuring skills’