Colonial America did not run on a single, uniform currency. Long before a federal mint existed, everyday commerce relied on a shifting mix of foreign coins, local experiments, and privately produced tokens. English crowns, shillings, and pence circulated alongside Dutch, French, and Spanish pieces with the Spanish 8 reales, the “piece of eight,” serving as a widely used and well-documented trade coin in British North America. In many places, coin shortages forced colonists to rely on non-coin money as well, including wampum, grain, barter, and promissory instruments. Out of this environment came a wide range of pre-1776 issues, some struck under colonial or royal authority, others made for private or regional purposes, and still others created for audiences that were not even in America but later crossed the Atlantic.
What links these pieces is not a single standard, but a shared reality. Money in the colonies was whatever people would accept. Often it was foreign coin, but credit, paper, and locally accepted substitutes also filled gaps during shortages.
A Patchwork Economy Before 1776
The pre-independence economy was shaped by geography and scarcity. Port cities saw heavier inflows of foreign silver and gold, while rural areas often faced chronic shortages of small change. Copper was especially important because it filled the practical need for low-value, everyday purchases. When official copper was absent or unreliable, unofficial substitutes stepped in.
Some issues were created under British royal patents or colonial permissions, while other pieces were made privately, sometimes as patterns, sometimes as promotional tokens, and sometimes as local stopgaps. These objects blur modern categories. A medal made as propaganda could end up circulating. A private token might trade like a coin because it was copper or brass. Even within an “official” series, handmade dies and inconsistent production created numerous collectible types and variations.
Private and Regional Tokens From 1670 to 1776
Several privately associated pieces illustrate how wide the category of “money” could be in the colonies. One of the earliest and most visually unusual is the New Yorke in America Token, linked to colonial governor Francis Lovelace. Its obverse depicts Cupid pursuing Psyche, while the reverse shows a heraldic eagle tied to Lovelace’s family arms with the legend “NEW YORKE IN AMERICA”. Despite its colonial branding, it may have been produced in England and might not have circulated widely in New York itself. Pieces like this show how imagery, politics, and identity could merge on a monetary object.
Other tokens are defined more by limited documentation than by firm records. London Elephant Tokens, for example, were not struck for colonial America, yet some made their way across the Atlantic. Their importance grew when researchers connected their elephant die to the related Carolina and New England Elephant Tokens. In this light, the elephant design appears less like a one-off curiosity and more like a traveling motif reused for different markets and messages.
The colonies also produced locally associated pieces that may have filled real commercial gaps. The Higley or Granby Coppers, typically linked to Dr. Samuel Higley and his access to a local copper deposit (often associated with “Copper Hill”) in the Granby-area of colonial Connecticut, show how quickly a “token” can become money. The obverse features a deer and the reverse shows three hammers. Early examples declared a fixed worth with “THE VALUE OF THREEPENCE”, but later pieces adopted the flexible legend “VALUE ME AS YOU PLEASE”, an acknowledgment that acceptance set the coin’s value rather than law. These pieces are often described as unofficial, yet they may have circulated precisely because people needed copper and they contained usable metal.
Migration also carried coin-like objects into America. Hibernia–Voce Populi pieces, struck in Dublin in 1760, were not made specifically for the American market, but many crossed the Atlantic, whether through immigration, merchant shipment, or speculative export, and circulated in parts of British North America. Similarly, Pitt Tokens commemorated British politician William Pitt, who supported repeal of the Stamp Act. Struck in farthing and halfpenny sizes, the Pitt tokens include farthings in brass or copper, while the halfpennies are generally found in copper. Their design, with Pitt’s portrait on one side and a ship on the other, reinforces a recurring theme in colonial tokenage: commerce, shipping, and the Atlantic economy were central to how money was imagined.
Even pieces intended as propaganda could become part of the colonial monetary landscape. Rhode Island Ship Medals depict British admiral Lord Richard Howe’s flagship and a scene of American retreat from Rhode Island in 1778. Created for a Dutch audience and likely struck in England around 1779, they still appear in American contexts, illustrating how political messaging and circulation could overlap.
State Coinage and Royal Patent Issues, 1652 to 1775
Alongside private tokens were colonial and state-linked coinages, some of which are foundational to American numismatic history. Massachusetts stands out as the earliest major example of coinage made in the English-speaking colonies. Authorized to produce its own silver, Massachusetts first issued extremely simple threepence, sixpence, and shilling denominations: small planchets with minimal marks that proved vulnerable to clipping and counterfeiting. To address those weaknesses, Massachusetts adopted the more recognizable Willow Tree, Oak Tree, and Pine Tree designs. Under mintmaster John Hull in Boston, these issues became well-known not for elegance but for demonstrating a colony’s attempt at monetary self-reliance.
Maryland’s Lord Baltimore Coinage offers another early attempt at localized authority expressed through coin. Under Cecil Calvert, the second Lord Baltimore, Maryland ordered silver denominations in 1659, including shillings, sixpence, and groats. These coins bore Calvert’s portrait and Latin titles identifying him as “Lord of Mary’s Land,” while the reverses of larger pieces included the Baltimore family arms and Roman numeral denominations. Although the issue was limited and largely vanished from circulation by around 1700, it remains a landmark in colonial monetary experimentation.
New Jersey’s St. Patrick or Mark Newby pieces show yet another pathway: a foreign-made coin becoming local money by legal declaration. Likely struck in Dublin between 1663 and 1672, these farthings and halfpennies were made legal tender in New Jersey in 1682. Their imagery is distinctive, featuring a kneeling king playing a harp on the obverse and St. Patrick on the reverse, sometimes with a brass plug inserted at the crown’s location, which both emphasized the design and served as a counterfeit deterrent. In a world short on coin, legal tender status could be granted to whatever was available and trusted.
Finally, royal patent issues helped supply coinage to the colonies, even if not always with colonial enthusiasm. Examples include the tin American Plantations Tokens of 1688, the Rosa Americana coinage tied to William Wood, the Hibernia coins, and the 1773 Virginia halfpennies. These issues demonstrate that the crown understood the need for circulating coin in America, even if the results varied in quality, reception, and survival.
By the eve of independence, the colonies had already lived through a long era of improvisation. Pre-1776 private tokens, local copper experiments, and colony- or patent-based coinages were not just collectibles today. They are physical evidence of an economy that functioned without standardization, relying instead on practicality, trust, and persistent shortage.
