Coins on the Titanic

DocMortar

Before credit cards how did people carry $$$ when they traveled overseas? Did they use gold coin or currency? Would the Titanic wreck site have any valuable coins?

Coinosaurus

I saw some coins at the Titanic exhibit in Chicago. They were common US and British coins, and way damaged. Obviously quite valuable as Titantic artifacts though.

IIRC, these were stolen out of the Chicago exhibit and later recoved.

BillJones

Going by the displays (the one that has been all around the country, which includes "the big piece" and the one in Orlando, FL, there were coins and currency found from the wreck site. There were both coins and currency found. I don't think that a lot of 19th century people carried much gold with them, although there were a couple of gold pieces in the displays.. Most of what people carred was small change and paper. Since it was an international voyage, there were a fair number of British coins and currency found along with the U.S. material. The notes I saw often had missing corners, and the coins had seawater damage.

Shamika

<< <i> Before credit cards how did people carry $$$ when they traveled overseas? >>


People would carry cash in wallets and a ship safe much like many people still do today. Once they arrive at there international destination, they can exchange their foreign money for native money. Money exchangers have been around for centuries.

dizzyfoxx

I think that would be QUITE a valueable pedigree for a PCGS or NGC slab label to indicate a coin was recovered from the Titanic wreckage, regardless of the condition of the coin.

BillJones

Here’s the only item the general public has been able to buy from the Titanic wreck site … a lump of coal.

This bit of coal does have tiny bit of history. I’ve read that there was a coal miners’ strike at the time of the sailing, the White Star Company, which owned the ship had a devil of a time rounding up enough fuel for the voyage. A good part of it ended up at the bottom of the Atlantic.

CoinRaritiesOnline

I think that coal has been dipped and retoned to make it appear blacker than it really is.

MAD4MORGANS

<< <i>I think that coal has been dipped and retoned to make it appear blacker than it really is.

>>



I'm sure it willl make someonea great Christmas present.

BillJones

<< <i>I think that coal has been dipped and retoned to make it appear blacker than it really is.

>>



No actually it's been whizzed, but it does have a Certificate of Origin, but no slab.

Who knows this piece may have been pushed around by the Jack Dawson.

No not THE fictional Jack Dawson who got the girl, but also got drowned. There is a Jack Dawson in the Nova Scotia Titanic cemetery. He was a “leveler.” The poor bloke’s job was to even out the coal pile as it was fed to the boilers to help keep the ship on an even keel. Like most employees and third class passengers, he did not have much of chance for survival when the ship went down. But a lot of ladies have now made his grave marker a sort of shrine because of his name sake in the film.

UncleWiggly

<< <i>Here’s the only item the general public has been able to buy from the Titanic wreck site … a lump of coal.

This bit of coal does have tiny bit of history. I’ve read that there was a coal miners’ strike at the time of the sailing, the White Star Company, which owned the ship had a devil of a time rounding up enough fuel for the voyage. A good part of it ended up at the bottom of the Atlantic.

>>




Didn't the Royal Canadian Mint issue a coin with a piece of the Titanic coal that came out when the movie did? I'm pretty sure I saw an ad for them recently.

Also, RareCoinWholsellers is selling U.S. Silver Certificates and Italian Lire graded by PCGSC from the Andrea Doria
if someone is interested in that type of artifact.



Jerry

cladking

In 1912 most wealthier people would use checks for expenses and intend to
cash one in New York(?) when they arrived. Most would also carry paper cur-
rency for more immediate needs. There probably would have been a fair amount
of gold but most of this would have been kept in the safe along with other extremely
valuable items. I don't know if the safe has been recovered or not, but it's unlikely.

BillJones

I think they found the front of a safe, but the back was out of it. Needless say there were no valuables found in that.

cladking

Here is an interesting older pice about where the valuables may be.

The safe itself was apparently empty.



<< <i> When the ship began to list, most of the ladies headed for the Purser's office to fetch their jewels. In fact, the Purser sent crew members to remind passengers to retrieve their valuables. Apparently, he was tying up loose ends. Successfully, too, it would seem. When his safe was salvaged and opened on a 1987 TV spectacular, it was empty. >>

lordmarcovan

I think there were some British gold sovereigns found, among other things.

DaveG

At that time, wealthy people would have travelled with "circular letters of credit" to use on their European shopping sprees.

They could have also wired money to a European office of American Express and withdrawn the money upon arrival.

carl

<< <i>Before credit cards how did people carry $$$ when they traveled overseas? Did they use gold coin or currency? Would the Titanic wreck site have any valuable coins? >>


Not sure about the Titanic's coins. Just to many stories floating around about that. However, to answer about what people did for money in the old days, say a few hundred years ago, they would just wait till they got to where they were going and find a cash station and withdraw what they needed in the currency of that place. There were numerous problems with so many of the early Roman and Greek coins not being round enough to properly run through some machines such as wahers and dryers. They would work well on toll booth machines but got jamed in gum ball machines. There are reports that the later cave man error, Piltdown Man, had problems with cash registers also.

ricman

At the Titanic exhibit in Cleveland a few years ago there was a decent Barber Half on display with other recovered items.

pontiacinf

<< <i>I think that coal has been dipped and retoned to make it appear blacker than it really is.

>>



now that was funny

edited to add: theres a major seller in coin world that carries alot of canadian coins, and I believe there is one that commemerates the titanic that has titanic coal encased in the center. I will have to check when i go home.

RWB

If I recall correctly, in 1900 just before passage of the Gold Standard Act, the Mint was asked to determine how much gold travelers carried with them on trips between the US and Europs. The ships’ exchange agents, foreign banks and money exchange agents said that First Class and Second Class cabin passengers carried letters of credit and travelers’ cheques with only a small amount of gold coin in their pockets. Jewelry was the high value item for wealthy passengers. Steerage passengers carried $10 to $20 in gold which they usually had in the currency of the country they were visiting. (I.e.: if going to visit Uncle Rocco in Syracuse, one carried Lira.

In 1905 Charles Barber did a “semi-Grand Tour” of European mints and found that US gold coin received as trade payment was immediately melted and restruck as local coin. (This is the same thing the US mints did.) Travelers carried little gold coin and almost no silver.


Regarding Carl’s comment: “There were numerous problems with so many of the early Roman and Greek coins not being round enough to properly run through some machines such as washers and dryers.”

Pre-Columbia travelers to Europe had considerable problems with these since many of the public baths and laundries were run by old Roman water wheels. They only accepted denari for small loads of laundry and Byzantine (Nova Roma) solidi for family-size laundry. Hand scrubbing of shirt collars was 10 nummi extra.

kiyote

<< <i>Before credit cards how did people carry $$$ when they traveled overseas? Did they use gold coin or currency? Would the Titanic wreck site have any valuable coins? >>



Any coin from the Titanic would have value as a relic that would far exceed any numismatic market value. I saw the exhibit in SF last week-- it was nice. A lot of Barbers were in the collection.