German East Africa 5 heller--Gun metal

dingding

the upper is my newest collection, could you tell me the difference between them?

Philip

Yes, the base of the crown. The first base is flat, the second elongated

JamminJ

Devices are larger on the lower one. The branches, ribbobs and clovers all hit the rim on the lower but not the upper.

-JamminJ

dingding

All the answers are right! and there is still another difference, the upper one is thicker than the lower one.

Philip

<< <i>All the answers are right! and there is still another difference, the upper one is thicker than the lower one.

>>



And more worn

Askari

These 1916-dated 5 Hellers and the 20 Hellers and gold 15 Rupien are wartime issues from the only German mint established outside of Germany -- Tabora, hence the 'T' mintmark. Since GEA was cut off from its homeland, everything they had had to be produced by themselves or captured from the enemies who surrounded and blockaded them. These coins were made from scrap copper and brass. Sources include spent cartridges, wiring, home furnishings, and so on. All are crudely struck except for the gold coins which were more carefully designed and produced on a steam-driven palm oil press.

The 5 Hellers were made of brass and some 302,000 were produced, mostly of the thick, oval-base crown variety. There are no extant records I know of that tell how many were produced of each die type. Both of the types shown in Ding-Ding's photos are very well-struck for the type and his example of the less common thin, flat-base crown type is quite nice.

The 20 Hellers come in copper and brass versions and there are 2 obverse and 3 reverse designs, all of which occur together in both medals, although some combinations are quite rare. Altogether, some 325,940 copper and 1,307,760 brass 20 Hellers were made.

The gold 15 Rupien were possible because of a small gold mine in operation not very far away from Tabora. There are two slightly different designs and 9803 of one type and 6395 of the other were struck. Many were captured by the allies when they finally took Tabora and these were either melted down or taken as war souvenirs by the troops -- which account for a good percentage of the uncirculated examples extant.

dingding

Thank you Askari, great information!

PS: I made a mistake, the lower is thicker.

ColinCMR

very neat!