New Corrected Coin Book On South African Coins

That has been the debate for years now.

Now the matter has been put to rest

Hello Karel

I spent 30 years researching the Griqua people, culminating in my 2007 published book "Children of the mist". See: http://www.griquas.com

I have a huge related library of books which I used to first expose the great untruth in the claim that the Griquatown tokens CIRCULATED as money.

Prior to my research on this topic, which you refer to, it was claimed in many South African coin books, including the coin catalgues by Hern, that the Griquatown tokens circulated widely as money in Griquatown in 1815-16 for a period of two years. Facts never change, here is a link to my over ten year old research disputing this claim: http://www.tokencoins.com/book.htm#key

Attached to this claim about the tokens in these coin books was the suggestion that they were South Africa's first widely circulating indigenous coinage.

As you would be aware this is the disputed issue, not how they got to Griquatown or who resolved they should be minted in the first place.

I really don't care if they were sent by God himself - the FACT remains that they FAILED in their purpose, as confirmed by Ann Stuart's latest independent research.

This has been the point I have been trying to make for over ten years and have faced ridicule by a few hard nosed coin collectors in South Africa.

For the record the Griquatown tokens are fantasy coins - the only purpose they ever played in the Griqua community circa 1819-20 was as trinkets when the resident missionary disposed of a few before it dawned on him they would never circulate as money.

For the record Peter Anderson, a direct descendant of the resident missionary at Grquatown at the time, William Anderson, spent eight months going through all the contemporary LMS writings of his ancestor and others and did not find one reference to the tokens.

See the email exchanges: http://www.tokencoins.com/petera.htm

and

http://www.tokencoins.com/petera1.htm

If my, now confirmed, expose on these fantasy tokens makes me a clever man then so be it. More the fool those who for years ridiculed what was so glaringly obvious - something like the story about the Emperor with no clothes.

Scott Balson

"Karel"

You obviously have no idea what the debate is about so let me enlighten you.

http://www.tokencoins.com/The%20truth.pdf

If you bother to read this PDF you will see that the author, Pierre Henri Nortje, (who I respond to in the PDF) committed research fraud and then gained an award from the National Numismatic Society in Johannesburg for plagiarising selectively from my earlier research on this subject. This fact is not disputed and proven at this link: http://www.tokencoins.com/nortje.htm

Nortje's research fraud is astounding yet the Secretary of the National Numismatic Society, Brian Hern, presented him with the award because it claimed the Griquatown tokens CIRCULATED. Hern just coincidentally happens to be the publisher of S African coin catalogues up to 2013 which claim the tokens circulated widely in 1815-16 (before they were even minted according to Ann Stuart's recent research and Scott Balson (my) older research). The award was presented within weeks of Nortje's fraudulent PDF being published while my eleven year old published research which corrected a great wrong and led to this independent project by Stuart on behalf of Morgan Carroll was correct.

So you get a fraud, Nortje, being recognised by the National Numismatic Society in Johannesburg on behalf of its Secretary Brian Hern legitimising the claim in his coin catalogues that the Griquatown tokens circulated while my published research which has been on the money for eleven years is ignored and has yet to be recognised by the committee of that club. In fact they refused to table my research to their members in 2006 when Hern was Secretary - he has been secretary there for over 20 years now.

I am not going to get into a debate with you about this subject because I do know all the facts and you don't. As you are hiding behind a pseudonym you could well be Hern or Nortje so I really have nothing further to discuss with you.

In conclusion, with regards to Helm's comments referred to in (strangely) "Karel" Schoeman's research on the "The Mission at Griquatown" I was the first person to identify the relevance of this little known book eleven years ago. The transcript of the relevant extracts are carried at this link: http://www.tokencoins.com/helm.htm They include two key deliberate errors that, if you read point 50, in the PDF linked above prove the fact Nortje's research was a fraud and selectively plagiarised from my website covering this issue.

Good day

Scott Balson

For the record I researched the Griqua for 30 years.

Quote from Ms Stuart's conclusions undertaken on behalf of Morgan Carroll in her summing up:

Schoeman's sources attest to the failure of the coinage to have much impact in Griqualand, if indeed they were used at all which I have found no evidence of, particularly since their value was not clear.

Source - page 11 of Stuart's report seen at http://www.tokencoins.com/failure.pdf

Stuart's research was never as comprehensive as mine over 30 years. The only reason Carroll contracted Stuart to look into this is because the "Karel's" of numismatics who have their own hidden agenda refuted my earlier findings which have now been confirmed by her research. Strange it should be (once again) suddenly selectively embraced by the camp who refused to accept what I had reported many years ago.

I have summarised the proof that the Griquatown tokens never circulated in this one page PDF:

http://www.tokencoins.com/summation.pdf

If you do not reveal your true identity here I will have no further discussion with you, Mr Pierre Henri Nortje.

Scott Balson

I think the point here is that history is based on what we know, and what we know can change from one day to the next. For someone to declare something is so, when they don't have all the facts, A) because many of the facts will have been lost to us forever and B) because some of the facts will be hiding waiting to be found, is not a smart move.

Certainly I've seen this episode for a number of years on this forum and it does seem that some people wish to push an agenda, for whatever reason, rather than actually just accepting that as humans we can't know everything about our history.

Known facts:

1 When Anderson returned to Griquatown from Cape Town in 1814 the people there had lost faith in him. In fact the major Griqua families left Griquatown leaving the settlement a ghost town until 1820.
2 There was no shop in Griquatown in which to trade the tokens.
3 There was no hole in the tokens to facilitate carrying them with their beads.
4 The people there had no understanding of money (Prof Arndt)
5 The tokens are never listed as assets anywhere, at any time, by the LMS at Griquatown
6 There is not one reference to them by Campbell in his second book covering his trip to South Africa and Griquatown in 1820. In fact Campbell's only related comment in this book is that "regular trades do not exist in Griquatown".

Comment by Peter Anderson, direct descendant of the resident missionary at the time, who viewed all the LMS archives including those of Burchell, Campbell etc...

I certainly do not recall in any of the letters and journals any mention of local coinage/token in Griquatown during Anderson's time there. . it is my impression that had there been local coins produced and circulating during his time he would surely have mentioned this in his letters or journals.

Okay, but that doesn't mean the coinage didn't circulate. It also doesn't mean the coinage did circulate. You don't need a shop to have money circulating. You don't need people having an understanding of coinage either. No know listing of coins as assets anywhere doesn't mean that they didn't exist either.

What you have is speculation, and you should admit that this is what you have. You don't have total proof, you can't say this case has been closed, it never will be. Accept and move on.