Guernsey 2 doubles 1914 - Coat of Arms

The coin's story

The double was Guernsey's own small change. Until the early nineteenth century, the island mainly used French money, from 1830 it struck its own copper coins, the doubles, with a system of its own: 8 doubles were worth one Guernsey penny, and 12 pence one shilling. The 2 doubles coin was therefore worth a quarter of a penny, the equivalent of a farthing. British coins had been legal tender on the island since 1870, and French money still circulated there until 1921, when Guernsey aligned its pound with the pound sterling. This 1914 coin, from the year the First World War broke out, was struck by the private Heaton mint in Birmingham, whose letter H appears below the date. The type was struck from 1914 to 1929 in small quantities: only 29,000 pieces in 1914. The doubles disappeared with decimalisation in 1971.