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The King's War Coinage
The Shrewsbury Mint
Previously published in 'ECW Notes & Queries' (Caliver Books/Partizan Press)

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The abandonment of London by King Charles I early in 1642 cost him dearly in many ways, not the least of which was the loss of the Royal Mint, and subsequently the control of the supply of money to the country. Without adequate funds the Royalist war effort would have quickly ground to a halt, so plans were hastily formulated for the production of new coinage - simply to keep the Royalist cause alive.

During the Civil War King Charles I struck gold and silver at a number of emergency mints, including Oxford, Chester, Exeter and Shrewsbury. The Shrewsbury coins are of particular interest, not only for their rarity (the mint was only in the town for 4 months), but also for the fact that the early output was issued to the Royalist army only two days before the battle of Edgehill.

In London, Parliament had taken over the Royal Mint, and was striking coins in the King's name. To counter this an entrepreneur called Thomas Bushell was charged with the task of conveying the Aberystwyth Mint (set up in 1637) lock, stock and barrel to Shrewsbury in September 1642. Thomas Bushell was a remarkable man, and proved a tremendous asset to the Royalist cause in the early stages of the war. He was an engineer and speculator in the Welsh Mines, and apart from his pledge to coin and silver from them, he undertook to clothe three regiments in Shrewsbury at his own expense, and provide cannon and shot from his own foundries as well.

The Shrewsbury coins consisted of Ł1, 10 shillings, 5 shillings (a crown), 2/6 (half crown), and shilling pieces. A few Ł3 gold pieces were coined, but are extremely rare. The mint was credited with providing, on average, Ł1000 per week in currency until it was moved to Oxford in January 1643.

Rather confusingly, the Shrewsbury examples bore the identification mark of the Aberystwyth Mint - The three feathers (symbol of the Prince of Wales); but it is the inclusion of the inscription RELIG•PROT•LEG•ANG•LIBER•PAR that betrays their true origin. This is the Latin abbreviation of "THE PROTESTANT RELIGION, THE LAWS OF ENGLAND AND THE LIBERTY OF PARLIAMENT", and is based on the King's proclamation at Wellington in Shropshire, made shortly before his arrival at Shrewsbury.

So then it is clear that money bearing the Aberystwyth mark dated 1642, and bearing the RELIG•PROT inscription, can only have been produced at Shrewsbury. These words also appear on the much more common Oxford coinage of 1643-46. The money was distributed amongst the Royalist army at Wolverhampton just prior to the battle of Edgehill as follows: 20 shilling (£1) pieces to Colonels; 10 shilling and 5 shilling to Subalterns (junior officers) according to rank, and half crowns to private soldiers.

The King's decision to base himself at Oxford led to the removal of the mint to that city, and the short but fascinating story of the "Shrewsbury mintings" came to an end.

(insert coinage picture here)

Note: The array of weaponry portrayed on the obverse (heads) of the (£1) coin shown here, while hard to notice due to the drawing, includes a cannon, polearm and furled standard.