Coins from famous shipwrecks off Cornwall coast exceed estimates at auction
HISTORICAL coins recovered from a shipwreck off the Cornish coast were among several to surpass their estimate at an auction last month.
A single-owner collection of coins from historic shipwrecks more than doubled its estimate of £2,000-3,000 when it sold for £6,440 at a local auction on January 31.
Gildings Auctioneers’ specialist auction of jewellery, coins and clocks at Market Harborough featured 51 coins in four lots grouped according to the wrecks from which they were recovered from 1686 to 1806.
Among the successful bidders was a Scillonian diver who was part of the team that recovered some of the coins from shipwrecks around the Isles of Scilly in the early 1970s.
A Scillonian diver was part of the team that recovered some of the coins from shipwrecks around the Isles of Scilly in the early 1970s (Image: Gilding Auctioneers)
As the finders of the coins, the divers were officially referred to as “Berger-owned” and originally sold the coins at auction in 1975.
The standout lot in the auction was 17 coins from the Hollandia, a Dutch East India Company ship that was wrecked at Gunner Rock in the Isles of Scilly in 1743, resulting in the loss of 276 crew and company members.
Coins from this wreck, including Dutch ducats and Mexican pillar reales or ‘eights’ sold for £2,700 versus an estimate of £850 – £1,250.
Twenty-two coins of HMS Association, wrecked on the infamous Western Rocks of Scilly in October 1707 after having served with distinction in the capture of Gibraltar in 1704, sold for £2,300 having been estimated at £1,000 to £1,500.
A public outcry followed the total loss of the fleet of over 2,000 men due to a catastrophic navigational error under the command of Fleet Admiral Sir Cloudesley Shovell. This led to the Longitude Prize of £20,000 which eventually led to the invention of the marine chronometer in 1759.
A Scillonian diver was part of the team that recovered some of the coins from shipwrecks around the Isles of Scilly in the early 1970s (Image: Gilding Auctioneers)
Eight coins from HMS Athenienne fetched a value of £850 against an estimate of £400 to £600. T
His 66-gun ship was lost on October 20, 1806 on the Esquerques Rocks off the Italian island of Sicily, resulting in the loss of 347 crew members, including Captain Robert Raynsford.
The last group of coins, estimated at between £80 and £120 and sold for £380 that day, contained four coins from three different shipwrecks.
Princess Maria was lost on Silver Carn off the Scilly Isles in January 1686, De Liefde was wrecked off the Shetland Isles on 7 November 1711 and HMS Sprightly was lost on the Hanois Bank off Guernsey in December 1777.
HMS Association was wrecked at Scilly’s infamous Western Rocks in October 1707 (Image: Gilding Auctioneers)
Gildings Director Will Gilding said: “These very special coins drew bids from as far away as California and Florida as well as here in the UK including Shetland and the Isles of Scilly.
“However, they all found homes in the UK and it was a surprising but fitting twist in history to discover that our auction was able to reunite some of them with one of the pioneering underwater explorers who originally found them on the bottom from the sea in an era of unprecedented advances in diving technology that made possible the exploration of wrecks that had lain undisturbed for 300 years.”
The coins, all offered with their certificates of origin, were originally purchased by the seller from the WH Lane auctioneers in Penzance in their 1975 ‘Sale of Sunken Treasure’.
