Farringdon & A. Chapman Shilling Market Token

Hi.

Market tokens were a means of preventing fraudulent refunds when returning containers to food wholesalers.

In the 19th and early 20th century, shops selling fruit, vegetables, meat etc to the public would buy from wholesale markets. Goods were received in containers belonging to the wholesaler. Shops paid deposits on these containers, refundable on return. To prevent unscrupulous people stealing the containers and claiming the refund, wholesalers issued the shops with metal tokens to the value of the deposit. To claim the refund you needed to return the tokens at the same time as the containers.

Your token looks like one of these market tokens.