A large number of dealers from both this country and abroad will be in attendance at The Irish International Coin Fair to be held next weekend at Dublin's RDS, offering everything from coins and banknotes to military medals.
To coincide with the event, Whyte's auctioneers is holding a sale of similar material on Friday at its Marlborough Street premises. Two areas in the sale are likely to be of more general interest than the specialist coinage which takes up the greater part of the day.
The first is the section devoted to military uniforms. Lot 712, for example, is a rare 1782 Club uniform frock coat; despite the date in its name, this club was actually founded in the 19th century by Daniel O'Connell. In green brushed velvet, the front of the coat carries 16 original gilt buttons embossed with the numerals 1782 in a shamrock wreath.
The cuffs and collar are made of black velvet embroidered in gilt thread with more shamrocks. Another example of this coat has been on view in the National Museum in Collins Barracks but even so the price expected for the item is relatively low: £500-£700.
The estimate for lot 714 is even lower. A Georgian black silk cocked hat made by Sexton & Sons of Dawson Street, Dublin for an army officer, it has a silver bullion loop with silver button-bearing crown within a wreath and is expected to go for £150-£200.
Lot 720, an early 20th century black leather army dress belt with gilded buckle carries a pre-sale estimate of £60-£80, while lot 726, an Irish army full dress uniform from circa 1940 with captain's insignia has the considerably higher figure of £400-£500. An earlier section of the sale is also fascinating since it offers early examples of privately-issued bank notes. Among the first of these is lot 311, a silver note issued by F Parsons of Ennis, Co Clare in July 1804 for the sum of one shilling, seven and a half pence printed with the information that for this note "and as many more of my Accommodation Tickets as amounted to One Guinea, I will pay that Sum on demand".
It is now worth the rather greater sum of £350-£450, almost the same as the following lot, a one guinea note issued by Peter Blake of the Ennis Chronicle Office in March 1815 and made payable in "Limerick Bank Paper".
These notes indicate how vibrant was the local banking system in Ireland during the late 18th and early 19th centuries. And while many of the small institutions failed, others provided the origins for today's large financial businesses. Some of the banking names mentioned on the lots are Ffrench's of Dublin (lots 318-320, dating from 1814 and with individual estimates in the region of £120-£200), the Bank of Limerick (lots 330-336 inclusive, £130-£250) and Ross Bank of New Ross, Co Wexford (lot 341, an undated and unissued note from the second decade of the 19th century, £180-£220).
Amidst the wealth of later notes, lots 419 and 420 are worth noting. The first of these is a 19th century Bank of Ireland 30 shilling note stamped "Forgery" twice in red ink (£120-£140) and the second comprises three documents relating to the forgery of a Bank of Ireland one pound note in 1849 and the trial of the man held responsible for passing this into circulation (£80-£100).
Both are telling pieces of evidence that when the banking system was far less tightly regulated than today, fraudulence was relatively easy to perpetrate. These and many more lots - almost 850 in total - feature in the Whyte's sale next Friday beginning at 1 p.m.
