1/2 Penny Middlesex - London / W. Waterhouse

Waterhouse operated as a warehouse and wholesale supplier in London during the late 1790s, a period when the near-total collapse of official small-denomination coinage forced tradesmen across England to commission their own copper tokens simply to make change. The Middlesex series is among the most densely populated of all county token issues — hundreds of merchants entered the market simultaneously, and Withers 840 sits in a crowded field.

Davis 64 cross-referencing confirms this as a recognized variety rather than an obscure die muling, which matters when distinguishing genuine merchant issues from the speculative tokens struck purely for collector sale, a rampant practice by 1798.