Massachusetts "Oak Tree" Silver Coins

About This Coin

The Massachusetts Oak Tree silver coins, struck in sterling silver (.925 fine) with irregular hand-cut planchet edges, represent the second of the three tree-design series produced at the Boston mint of John Hull and Robert Sanderson during the 1660s. The Oak Tree design succeeded the extremely rare Willow Tree series and preceded the more common Pine Tree coinage, with all three series bearing the date 1652 regardless of their actual year of production — a deliberate anachronism intended to maintain the fiction that coining began under the original 1652 authorization and thus predated the Restoration of Charles II in 1660. The obverse features a stylized oak tree within a beaded border, accompanied by the colony's name MASATHVSETS IN, while the reverse displays the denomination in Roman numerals (XII for shilling, VI for sixpence, III for threepence, or II for twopence) within a double ring with the date and NEW ENGLAND AN DOM. The oak tree was likely chosen for its symbolic significance — the Charter Oak of Hartford fame and the broader association of oaks with strength and endurance in English culture. Oak Tree coins are struck on planchets that were individually cut and hammered to approximate weight, giving each piece a unique irregular shape that distinguishes colonial silver from the machine-produced roundness of later coins. Collectors value Oak Tree silver for its combination of 17th-century colonial history, handcraft production character, and the romantic association with Massachusetts Bay Colony's act of monetary independence from the English crown.