1 Penny - Robert Hyde and Co. Melbourne, Victoria

Robert Hyde & Co. operated as an ironmonger and general hardware merchant in Melbourne during the goldrush decade, when the colonial government's chronic failure to supply adequate small change left a vacuum filled almost entirely by private traders. The so-called "dump and holey dollar" era was long past, and the new problem was simple volume — the population of Victoria had exploded from roughly 77,000 in 1851 to over half a million by mid-decade, and official copper simply could not keep pace.

Hyde's tokens were struck in Birmingham, almost certainly by Ralph Heaton & Sons, who supplied the majority of Australian merchant tokens during this period.