1 Cash Bencoolen

The Bencoolen factory — established on Sumatra's west coast in 1685 after the English were expelled from Bantam by the Dutch — required local small change almost immediately, and London was in no position to supply it promptly. These cash pieces were struck for pepper-trade transactions at a remote, disease-ridden outpost that killed staff at such rates the Company struggled to keep it staffed at all. Bencoolen remained an English liability for nearly 140 years before being ceded to the Dutch under the 1824 Anglo-Dutch Treaty.