1896 & 1903/2 Trade Dollars

These are commonly faked, but the fakes are usually either have wrong details or aren't made of silver. These ones look fine to me, so if they pass any silver test you throw at them, and the weights match, then they're probably OK.

You may also find some British collectors objecting to them being filed under "British coins". They are in that curious category of being British Imperial standard coinage that never saw circulation or use in Britain itself, and weren't even made in Britain (they were made in India, for use in trade with China). So while the rest of the world tends to file them under "Great Britain", folks in Britain itself file them under "China". You won't find them listed in Spink, or any other British-made coin catalogue.

The only other coins that fall in the same general category are the Anchor money dollars and fractions struck in the 1820s, which are normally filed under "British West Indies" and/or "Mauritius" since that's where most of them ended up.

I know there are a lot of fakes out there. These are from an older collection that was mostly put together in the 50's to early 80's. I've ordered a new digital scale that will measure to .01 gram to get a more accurate weight.