Ein Kreuzer - 1816

This is the oldest coin in my collection: one Austrian Kreuzer minted in 1816. My Uncle-in-law gave me this coin when I was a little boy. He actually had a very interesting life and so does this coin.

His family was given a creed from Katherine the Great that bestowed nobility on them (and he still has the creed). Of course, all of that nobility was lost in Russian Revolution that ushered in Communism. The family was not viewed too kindly in the eyes of the revolutionaries so they packed what they could in a trunk and left for Germany. They stayed for a while but Hitler's scary rise to power caused them to flee back to Russia. The trunk came back with them and this coin was inside.

Having lived in Germany, my Uncle was fluent in German and he was conscripted to translate intercepted messages. The stigma of being a noble was forgotten during the war but after the war the communists made no secret that he was not welcome in his own country unless he denounced his heritage. He wasn't about to do that so he pretty much defected. The Soviets were happy to see a noble flee so they can claim his land. It's kind of hard to defect with a trunk filled with your life possessions so he sent the trunk on a rail cart to be locked away in storage, somewhere in what was Western Germany. Then, when he would arrive (by another rail car), he could claim his trunk and go on with life. The trunk was stored but then seemingly lost. Probably not on purpose. Bar code scanners didn't exist back then. The trunk sat in a storage locked, unclaimed for a long time. In there was the creed... and this coin.

The trunk was discovered in the 70s and somehow, through some miracle, the finders of the trunk were able to connect the dots and contact my Uncle. It probably helped that he joined the US Army so there was a pretty good paper trail of who and where he was. I think the people who found the trunk found more than one trunk. Their goal was probably to reunite people with their possessions that were lost during and after WW II.

And can you believe that nothing in that trunk was stolen? The creed was there. Several antiques, icons, books... and this coin.

So, here's to a almost 200 year old Kreuzer!



-- Boris