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Message:: [QUOTE="johnmilton, post: 4634617, member: 101855"]I have been an admirer of King George VI, who is Queen Elizabeth II's father, since I started to collect British coins and saw the film "The King's Speech." I stammered or shuddered when I was a child, and it was very embarrassing. Fortunately, I grew out of it, but he never really did. Instead he had to use the techniques that speech therapists teach you. No one thought that George VI would ever become king. He was the younger brother to Edward VII who was expected to inherit the crown. Edward didn’t want to live in the royal fishbowl, and he had a fatal attraction for older, married women. Kings were sort expected to have mistresses … There have been so many of them through out history that could almost be expected. But to invade on another man’s territory in modern times carried with it a huge risk. In the old days, kings to not adverse to paying off a husband or quietly doing away with him, but in modern times that was shall we say awkward. When Edward feel for Wallace Simpson, a twice divorced woman, it was the last straw. He had to give her up or relinquish the crown. For him that was an easy choice because he never really wanted to be king anyway. Later on, his excessive interest in the Third Reich would be even more embarrassing. At any rate Edward’s abdication made George VI king, which was something no one had expected. The 1937 coronation coin set comes in two pieces. I am not aware that the copper, silver and gold sets were ever issued together, but perhaps there might one lurking out there. The silver set is quite attractive. I bought one at the Winter FUN show. [ATTACH=full]1145967[/ATTACH] This got me to thinking about the gold set, which contains four coins, the half sovereign, sovereign, two pound and five pound pieces. I have had really nice sovereign for a few years. [ATTACH=full]1145969[/ATTACH] [ATTACH=full]1145970[/ATTACH] Unfortunately my tastes in gold coin run to nice pieces. I have never into "hole fillers" with problems, and that gets expensive. Since I can't got to any shows for the foreseeable future, I've been shopping on the Internet. I can do pretty with photos there, but Proof coins pose a special problem. It's hard to tell how nice they from most photos. And I've had a bit too much experience to trust the grades on the holders. I ran into this five pound piece a couple of weeks ago. It is graded PR-64, Cameo, which is a somewhat low grade for one of these coins, but this one looked much better than average. I ordered it, and it turned out to be a pleasant surprise. [ATTACH=full]1145971[/ATTACH] [ATTACH=full]1145974[/ATTACH] This coin is heavier than U.S. $20 gold piece. From what I can see from the Spink guide book, Charles II started issuing this coin's ancestors, the five guineas pieces, in 1668. The British Mint continued to issue them until they switched over sovereigns during the last days of George III. These coins are described as “of highest rarity.” The five pound don’t seem to become “common” until the late stages of Queen Victoria’s rule when the prices in the catalog fall to £ 3,500 in EF. Dealers have told me that these large, gold “trophy coins” are popular in Asia. Now I’m looking for the half sovereign and two pound piece. For me the biggest problem with most coins that I see are significant scratches and most especially unsightly copper spots. I expect to see small spots here and there, and I like coppery gold toning, but big spots bug. At any rate I feel as if I have crossed an important milestone in putting together the 1937 gold Proof set when I located this coin. I post more about this history George VI in a later post.[/QUOTE]

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