Any Conder historians?

rwyarmch · September 14, 2006 12:53PM

I got interested in this little grouping due to the similarity in design.
-The 1797 halfpenny token on the left is Warwickshire Birmingham 223.
-In 1838 W.J.Taylor (of British restrike fame) was hired by M. Young
to create a private token. The resulting token strongly resembled
Warwickshire 223 with the beehive replaced by Young's numismatic
cabinet. (Did that little stinker get hold of the dies for Warwickshire 223
and do them up?) Unfortunately the first die quickly broke and Mr. Young died
before the second could be used.
-In 1843, a Mr. Nightingale hired the same W.J.Taylor to create his
private token, shown in the middle, and it too featured a numismatic cabinet.
-In 1879, J. Henry contends that he came into possession of the second
die prepared for Mr. Young and used it to prepare his private token
shown on the right. (Maybe the second die was part of the Young estate
and Taylor came up with a similar one for Nightingale's token.)

Any conder historians know the real poop?

AuldFartte · September 15, 2006 12:11AM

I have no idea about "the rest of the story", but what you have given us is fascinating. The similarities between those tokens is so obvious. I've never even seen the latter two before. Thanks for posting this !!!

Conder101 · September 16, 2006 3:45AM

While Young's die certainly appears to be based on the War 223, with just a little observation it is clear that it and the 1843 die differ in almost every detail. Likewise there are very very many differences between the 1843 and the 1879 die. The similarity between the last two is almost certainly due to the fact that the same engraver created both dies. The original dies for War 223 were cut by an engraver named Webb (for some reason Waters does not identify an engraver by tht name) and struck by Peter Kempson. Now the different manufacturers frequently sold their dies to other manufacturers, so it may be possible that Young had acquired the die between 1797 and 1838. I would say that there is no chance that either of the later die being made from the dies that preceeded it.

theboz11 · September 16, 2006 5:20AM

Here is a good site.The Condor Cabinet

cosmicdebris · September 16, 2006 9:23PM

That first one looks awfully familiar.

rwyarmch · September 22, 2006 4:00AM

I received the middle token shown at the beginning of the thread (1843) yesterday and found it odd (then again, I'm odd!) According to Bell, it's actually an 1845 follow-up version of a token originally struck for Mr. Nightinggale in 1843. Mr. Nightingale supposedly had this private token (often just show-off pieces) struck in gold, silver and bronze and then had the dies destroyed. Ok, but heck, this unc. has what appears to be raised evidence of die rust strewn throughout the obverse and reverse. A rusted die from 2 years prior that no one bothered to polish for a private issue!? Or produced after 1845 from a die that supposedly was destroyed? Or... something else?

Conder101 · September 25, 2006 1:34PM

Possibly the dies were not destroyed in 1843 and were used by someone else to create the restrike version in 1845. that would explain the rust and the lack of interest in having it appear its best when it was used again.

Any Conder historians?

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