1 Shilling - George VI Pattern

Pattern coinage for British West Africa in 1943 was driven by wartime material shortages — the standard cupro-nickel alloy was a strategic commodity, and the Colonial Office was actively trialling substitute compositions across multiple African dependencies simultaneously. Nickel brass was among several candidates tested that year, though it never entered circulation for this denomination in the territory.

Surviving examples are almost exclusively from official or institutional collections. The West African Currency Board, which governed coinage across Nigeria, Gold Coast, Sierra Leone, and the Gambia, retained pattern pieces as administrative records rather than releasing them through normal channels.