Short-Lived Mints: Where And Why?

tdziemia My area of specialization is at present the Cap and Ray coins of Mexico. For that series there were actually three mints that operated for very short intervals.

The first is Catorce which operated from 1863 to 1869 but which produced coins dated 1863 only. Total mintage consisted of just over 3 million coins and it is the hardest mint to locate. This mint was approved late in the Presidency of Benito Juarez when political unrest plagued the country. The fact that it raised suspicions of political favoritism added to the problems. The mint was actually approved over objections from locals who did not believe it was needed. It did not help that the person who got the lease was given favorable treatment by Juarez and speculation of some type of "pay-off" could not be controlled. As soon as the local government re-gained control of the state the mint was closed.

The second case is the mint of Estado de Mexico which operated from 1828 to 1830. This location was a political boondoggle since it was only 10 miles from the facility at Mexico City. There was no need for the mint and it closed very quickly.

The third instance is Guadalupe y Calvo which operated for the longest period from 1844 to 1852. This mint was established because of rich silver deposits found at that location that could not be safely transported several hundred miles to the nearest branch mint. The reason for the existence of this mint lasted only as long as the threats from Indians and bandits persisted and as long as the mine production continued.

Ideally mints once established should not be relocated often or at the whims of local interests. Mints are of necessity long term investments of a centralized authority.

I think that the three different reasons outlined above for these three mints' short lives are very typical of all briefly operating mints. Politics ranks first because people will take advantage of circumstances when they present themselves to profit personally, even when the results make no sense at all from national or financial perspective. The second reason is political unrest usually due to wars whether internal (war of succession) or national (wars of conquest or defense) necessitating the relocation of mints to pay for armies and avoid capture. The third reason is temporary expedience which at some times is justifiable - new mining discoveries or the necessity of reducing transportation distances are two such causes.

I once went to a talk on Saxon and Norman Britain and the speaker mentioned the coinage system. He said that many of the mints active in England during this period would probably have consisted of a single moneyer with a pair of dies, whose main responsibility would be melting down foreign bullion and recoining it as English silver pence.

England has had other short-lived mints: numerous cities struck emergency coins during the Civil War in the 1640s, and branch mints were set up in the 1690s to make large quantities of silver coins to replace the old hammered coins, which were then being withdrawn. And in the year 2000 a single coining press was brought from The Royal Mint to the Millennium Dome (now the O2 entertainment center) in London to strike special commemorative £5 coins for visitors to the Dome.