1 Farthing Middlesex - Spence's / Pig

Thomas Spence, a radical Newcastle-born bookseller operating from a shop in London's High Holborn, used the token trade of the 1790s as a vehicle for political propaganda at a moment when conventional publishing carried genuine legal risk. The copper token boom of that decade, driven by a chronic shortage of regal small change, gave radicals, tradesmen, and satirists alike a semi-legitimate medium for circulating seditious messages — the authorities found it difficult to prosecute a coin. Spence issued hundreds of distinct varieties, many attacking landlordism and advocating common ownership of land.

DH#1117 is among his more pointed pieces. Spence was briefly imprisoned in 1794 under the suspension of Habeas Corpus.