French & Swonger Piqua, Ohio

French & Swonger operated during the decade when Civil War-era metal shortages drove hundreds of American merchants to commission private copper tokens as functional small change. The federal government's suspension of specie payments in 1862 pulled cents and fractional coins from circulation almost overnight, leaving shopkeepers across Ohio to fill the gap themselves. Piqua, a Miami County trading hub on the Miami & Erie Canal, produced several such merchant tokens during this period.

The Fuld attribution places this firmly within the documented Ohio series, cross-referenced against the merchant card token census compiled by George and Melvin Fuld.