Pattern - 1 Shilling - Edward VIII Reverse Trial

Edward VIII's abdication in December 1936 left a cascade of prepared coinage stranded mid-production across the Commonwealth. Australia had been advancing its own transition from George V types, and this reverse trial — struck in 1937 after the abdication was already fact — represents the RAM working through pattern approvals for a reign that had already ended. The obverse portrait question had been contentious from the start: Edward had insisted on being depicted facing left, breaking the centuries-old alternating tradition, a demand that complicated die preparation across every issuing authority simultaneously.