Profiles In Research: Katherine Smoak

These are the three principal coinages (Spanish, French and Portuguese) that circulated into the Caribbean before entering the U.S. Colonies and also used in the Caribbean principally Jamaica via counter-marking. The twist here is illustrating the Birmingham types which were counterfeited and then co-circulated in this monetary route with these principal country types ... this is something new ... tying these counterfeits as a Birmingham source? ... very interesting ... Sheffield GNL Type 1's is one thing ... this seems more difficult having collected West Indies. Perhaps this will lead to more answers of The Royal Mint's involvement (if any) and GNL CC8R Sheffield Plate Class 1's?


John Lorenzo
Numismatist
United States

... and from memory the Gibbs Collection which had its fair share of counterfeits and oddities. Again the twist here and the key point is how far can she prove and how much certainty with (any) evidence is there of a Birmingham origin on some of these contemporary circulating counterfeits? When I worked with Kleeberg at the ANS in the past on a couple of projects its amazing what an astute mind, the greatest numismatic library in the U.S. (debatable?) and the finest collection of West Indies (both regal and counterfeit) at your fingertips can take a person to discover some new evidence in this matter.

JPL