George III Announces A New Coinage

An August, 1797 issue of the London Gazette announced the new coinage of one and two pence pieces (Cartwheels).

My copy of that edition is framed (behind glass), so my scan is not very clear. To make it a bit more readable, I'm showing it here in greyscale. The actual wording is shown way below.


"The London Gazette
Published by Authority
From Saturday August 12, to Tuesday August 15, 1797

By the KING
A PROCLAMATION,
For giving Currency to a new Coinage of Copper Money of One Penny and Two Penny Pieces.

GEORGE R.

Whereas in consequence of the unanimous Address of Our Commons of Great Britain, in Parliament assembled, praying the We would be graciously pleaded to give Directions that Measures might be taken for an immediate Supply of such Copper Coinage as might be best adapted to the Payment of the Laborious Poor in the present Exigency; We have thought fit to order that certain Pieces of Copper should be coined, which should go and pass for One Penny and Two Pennies, and that each of such Pieces of One Penny should weigh One Ounce Avoirdupois, and that each of such Two Penny Pieces should weigh Two Ounces Avoirdupois ; the intrinsic Value of such Pieces of One Penny and Two Pennies, Workmanship included, corresponding as nearly as possible with the nominal Value of the same respectively; every such Piece having, on one Side thereof, Our Effigies or Portraiture, with Our Name or Title, and one the Reverse, the Figure of Britannia, represented sitting on a Rock in the Sea, holding a Trident in her Left Hand, and a Branch of Olive in her Right Hand, with the Year of our Lord. --And whereas Penny and Two Penny Pieces of Copper, of the Weight and Description aforesaid, have been coined, and will be soon ready for Delivery, according to the Orders that We have give for that Purpose; : We have therefore, with the Advice of our Privy Council, thought fit to issue this Proclamation, and We do hereby ordain, declare and command, that all the said Pieces of Copper Money, to coined as aforesaid, shall be current and lawful Money of Our said Kingdom; that is to say, such Penny Pieces as of the Value of One Penny, and such Two Penny pieces as of the Value of Two Pennies, in all Payments and Transactions of Money ; provided that no Person shall be obliged to make more of such Copper Money in any one Payment, than shall be of the Value of One Shilling, after the Rate aforesaid.

Given at Our Court at St. James's, the Twenty-sixth Day of July, One Thousand seven hundred and ninety-seven, in the Thirty seventh Year of Our Reign.

GOD save the KING."


Bill

P.S. There is a Tax Stamp in the lower right corner of the newspaper. It is shown enlarged at the top of this page. It was this Tax, applied to both English citizens and to Colonists, that got the Colonists very riled up.