1715 coins never were circulated

[Island Man USVI]

In the early 1960s, the Virgin Islands government began dredging sand out of Gregerie channel to fill a swampy area of Crown Bay, St Thomas. Gregerie Channel was traditionally used as a staging (parking) area for boats waiting to have their cargo offloaded in the Charlotte Amalie harbor. In addition to many other artifacts, large amounts of small copper coins were found in the dredged sand. The coin books at that time made it clear that these were Danish West Indian coins. However, we never found an example of these exact coins in any publications. After sending samples to the Danish government and waiting more than a year we finally got a response. In 1715 the Danish government minted the first coins for the Virgin Islands. The boat delivering the coins sank in Gregerie channel between St Thomas and Water Island and the coins never went into circulation. All these years later I still have a small hand full of these treasures!

I was blessed to have grown up in St Thomas USVI. Started metal detecting when I was about 10 years old. I have lots of great memories of treasure hunting there. This is my favorite!

 

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[Jose The Goon]

That's cool ! Unique coins ! Very historic. 99.999 % of coin collectors around the world don't even know these coins were minted
and even exist today. You very well may have a "handful" of coins that could be in great demand some day once the word
spreads around. And, YOU know where to find more of them !! Congrats !!

 

[vpnavy]

Nice finds Island Man. Thanks for sharing...

 

[Kray Gelder]

Those are really amazing! Very cool.

 

[nsdq]

Sweet

 

[Whyme]

Wow that's awesome! Very cool finds! Congrats!

 

[Aureus]

Awesome and very interesting finds! Great historical coins!

 

[Inspector]

Great story and amazing coins, congrats on the possession of the historical coins

 

[Hawks88]

Wow! Congrats! And thanks for sharing the story and pictures with us.

 

[ARC]

Super cool.. thanks for sharing.

 

[basque-man]

Great story! Thanks for showing us!

 

[Professor of Engineering]

Outstanding!

 

[Locke]

Awesome back story! I just had a chance to metal detect on Virgin Gorda, so much potential out there!

 

[A2coins]

Amazing I can only dream of finding one of those Thanks for sharing thier story and your finds wow.

 

[A2coins]

Welcome also and Happy Easter Tommy

 

[catyron]

Thanks for sharing such a unique find and unusual back story.

 

[xcopperstax]

I love stories like this! The U.S. Virgin Islands are one of the few places I have visited. I sometimes wonder what it would be like to detect down there. Is it legal at this point?