George II 1746 LIMA Crown, MS63, ex Traveller, Spanish silver

George II (1727-60),silver Crown, 1746, LIMA below older laureate and draped bust left, legend and toothed border surrounding, GEORGIVS.II. DEI.GRATIA.,rev.crowned cruciform shields, ten strings to Irish harp, garter star at centre, date either side of top crown, Latin legend and toothed border surrounding, M.B.F.ET. H.REX. F.D.B. ET.L.D.S.R.I. A.T ET.E. (Bull 1668; ESC 125; S.3689).Attractively toned, practically as struck, slabbed and graded by NGC as MS63.

NGC Certification 8537561-001 with Traveller Collection label.

The Latin legends translate to on obverse "George II by the Grace of God" continuing on the reverse in abbreviated Latin which if in shown in full reads "Magnae Britanniae Franciae et Hiberniae Rex Fidei Defensor Brun et Lunebergen-sis Dux, Sacri Romani Imperii Archi-Thesaurius et Elector" and translates as "King of Great Britain, France and Ireland, Defender of the Faith, Duke of Brunswick and Luneberg, High Treasurer and Elector of the Holy Roman Empire."

The coins provenance marked LIMA under the bust are all made from silver from treasure captured from the Spanish by the English Privateers John Morecock and James Talbot, Captains of the Prince Frederick and the Duke in 1745.

The story behind these captures is revealed in detail in the new book published by Spink "The Metal in Britain's Coins" by Graham Birch, where Chapter 9 pages 116-142 deals with the back story of the journey of silver mined and coined in Peru by one nation, subsequently captured and finding its way reminted into the pockets of the populous of another nation, the two biggest sea powers of the era.

This coin has a most intriguing provenance being hidden away in a European family collection since before World War II. The "Traveller" was a wealthy gentleman who having inherited a portion of a successful family company, made a fortune by promptly selling it and then travelled the world on what was in part an extended honeymoon for the decade between the Wall Street Crash of 1929 and the outbreak of World War II. With the financial instability of the great depression and after dabbling at first with gold bullion, he decided to form an enormous collection of world gold coins from ancient to modern whilst travelling the world to see the relevant dealers in their geographical locations to find the most appropriate coins. The result was a collection of some 15,000 coins, 1,700 of which we are told are British, with all going into secure hiding as of 1940 when the nazi regime encroached on where our traveller was located. Sadly, the collector died of a stroke with the stress of the world situation at this time and the collection remained hidden away for decades, stored carefully in individual envelopes in cigar boxes within locked aluminium strongboxes, that were buried in the ground in a field at the collector's property. His wife carried the secret of the burial location for the decades following and reaching the end of her life some 50 years later divulged the secret to her only daughter, whereupon in the 1990s the family retrieved all the coins intact and secured them safely in a bank vault until it was time to sell by auction in 2025. Though we often hear of buried treasure or hoards of coins from antiquity in the ground, it is not often we hear of a sophisticated coin collection actually being buried for decades, an intriguing story to permanently associate with coins of the Traveller provenance which has been written about in newspapers and online worldwide. We are lucky enough to have secured a small number of rare British coins from this esteemed collection.

Provenance:
Ex The Traveller Collection, part 3.