1 Shilling - Chalmers With Birds

John Chalmers was a silversmith in Annapolis who struck these pieces in 1783 to address a genuine shortage of small change — Continental currency had collapsed, Spanish milled dollars were being cut into fragments, and the pieces didn't always add up honestly. Chalmers took matters into his own hands before any state or federal authority had managed to do so.

Two die varieties exist for this shilling, distinguished by the arrangement of the birds on the reverse — one shows the birds with a worm between them, the other without. PCGS tracks them separately under #595 and #596.