Rather, the dies usually featured some sort of patriotic theme. The Patriotics utilized generic, or “stock” dies, and did not explicitly feature any particular merchant or proprietor’s name or advertisement. The second, illustrated in this article, were known as Patriotics.

The first consisted of storecards, which were tokens that featured a merchant or proprietor’s name and advertisement. Both of which served a valuable need for merchants, proprietors, and the general public. Two distinct types of Civil War Tokens were struck. The first of such appeared in Chicago in the early decade of the 1860s, and quickly spread elsewhere. Resultantly, they found themselves forced to create and issue their own private coinages. With no coinage available, they were unable to conduct everyday transactions with their patrons. Merchants and proprietors found themselves in a difficult situation. coins of any denomination in circulation.

Virtually over night, there were practically no U.S. But before long, even copper coinage became extremely scarce. First gold and silver coins disappeared from circulation. The general public, concerned about possible increases in values of all metals, began hoarding their change. Patriotic Postal Cover Art from the Civil War PeriodĮarly in 1862 all United States coins disappeared from circulation.

Army & navy union civil war token