5 Dollars To the Heroes of the North Atlantic

The Marshall Islands began issuing collector coinage in 1986 under a program that leaned heavily on American themes — unsurprising given the islands' status as a U.S. Compact of Free Association territory. This piece commemorates the Allied convoy sailors and naval escorts of the North Atlantic campaign, where German U-boats sank over 3,500 merchant vessels between 1939 and 1945. The Battle of the Atlantic was the longest continuous military campaign of the war.

KM#118 is one of dozens of issues from the Marshall Islands' prolific 1990s commemorative output, struck in copper-nickel for the collector market rather than any domestic circulation.