Halfpenny - London Wapping / Joseph Stent

Joseph Stent issued this token from Wapping during the brief window permitted by the informal trade token system that filled the vacuum left by the Crown's failure to produce sufficient small change. The year 1666 places it squarely in one of London's most catastrophic moments — the Great Fire swept through the city that September, destroying over 13,000 houses and halting commerce across entire parishes. Whether Stent's business survived the aftermath is unrecorded, but tokens bearing his name from that year are among the more historically charged pieces of the series.