Coins of Australia - First Coins

First Coins

For many years after the first Australian colony, New South Wales, was founded in 1788, it did not have its own currency and had to rely on the coins of other countries. During the early days of the colony, commodities such as wheat were sometimes used as a currency because of the shortage of coins.

Spanish dollars were sometimes cut into "pieces of eight", quarters, and then into 2/3 and 1/3 segments, with the 2/3 segments (1/6 of original coin) being "shillings" and the 1/3 segments (1/12 of original coin) "sixpences" In 1791 Governor Phillip of New South Wales fixed the value of the Spanish dollar to equal five shillings.

Under the decree of 19 November 1800 by the governor Philip Gidley King the following coins were legal tender for the exchange value of:

• Guinea = £1/1/- (One pound and one shilling)
• Gold Mohur = £1/17/6 (one pound, 17 shillings and sixpence).
• Spanish dollar = 5 shillings.
• Ducat = 9/6 (9 shillings 6 pence).
• Rupee = 2/6 (2 shillings and 6 pence).
• Pagoda = 8/- (8 shillings).
• Dutch Guilder = 2/- (2 shillings).
• English shilling = 1/1 (1 shilling and 1 penny).
• Copper coin of 1 oz = 2 pence.

The settlers did have some George III one-penny coins, which were referred to as "Cartwheel pennies". These were the first British coins to be officially exported to the Australian colonies, and so can be considered Australia's first official coins. They were dated 1797 and 1799, with Britannia on one side and King George III on the other.

In 1812, Governor Lachlan Macquarie of New South Wales bought Spanish dollar coins, following the arrival of the ship Samarang at Port Jackson with 40,000 Spanish dollars, paying four shillings and nine pence for each dollar. He was worried that the coins would quickly be exported out of the colony and had holes cut in the middle of them to try to keep them in Australia. These were known as Holey dollars (valued at five shillings), with the piece from the middle being called the Dump (valued at around 15 pence). Both were declared legal currency on 30 September 1813 and went into circulation in 1814.

British currency became the official currency of the Australian colonies after 1825, with almost £100,000-worth of British coins being imported during 1824–25. The Holey dollar was no longer legal tender after 1829.