Don't Overlook Tokens if Your Ancestor was a Storekeeper

Henry Noldred Token 1650s

Last summer I found out that my 9th great-grandfather Henry Noldred of Ramsgate Kent England, was a grocer who had his own tokens created to spend in his store in place of official money.

Apparently that was often done in the 17th century when storekeepers would make their own money substitute.

I was so intrigued by this new-found information that I started researching to see if I could find any of his tokens and I found that one of his existed created circa 1650!. I also learned that Ramsgate was spelled Romansgate back then.

Once I found that one of Henry's tokens had been sold on an auction site a few months before, I became determined to find another and purchase it. I'm excited to say I succeeded! A rare coin and token dealer  in England found two for me, and I bought them both. The one is in the image above and the second one I bought is below. I plan on having a small plaque made with Henry's birth, death and location. Then I'll have the tokens and the plaque framed and it will have a place of honour on my wall.

This is the description of the tokens: (rosette)HEN.NOLDRED.IN.ROMANS , around beaded inner circle, three tobacco rolls / logs of wood.
Rev: (rosette)GET.IN.YE.ISLE.OF.TENNET , around beaded inner circle, HIS HALF PENY in three lines. M. Dickinson 454. Neither obverse or reverse dies represented in Norweb.

You never know what you might find on an ancestor if you look in unusual places! The Rare Coins and Tokens site I used has a very nice search engine if you want to start your own hunt for ancestor tokens.