Sommer Islands Dickeson Copies

About This Coin

Reproducing the exceedingly rare Sommer Islands (Bermuda) coinage of the early 1610s, the Dickeson Copies were manufactured by Montroville Wilson Dickeson — a nineteenth-century physician, archaeologist, and numismatist who produced copies of several extremely rare early American coins for the collector market of his era. The original Sommer Islands coins — commonly known as "Hogge Money" for the wild hog depicted on the obverse — represent the earliest English colonial coinage in the Western Hemisphere, struck around 1612-1615 for the Bermuda colony (originally named the Somers Islands after Admiral Sir George Somers, whose shipwreck there in 1609 inspired Shakespeare's "The Tempest"). The original coins were produced in four denominations — twopence, threepence, sixpence, and shilling — using a distinctive brass or copper alloy, and surviving genuine specimens are of extraordinary rarity and value, with the finest examples commanding six-figure auction prices. Dickeson's copies capture the essential design elements: the wild hog on the obverse with a sailing ship on the reverse, surrounded by period-appropriate inscriptions. As a physician and amateur archaeologist who participated in Mississippi Valley archaeological excavations and authored published works on American antiquities, Dickeson brought a scholarly sensibility to his numismatic reproduction work that distinguishes his copies from the purely commercial productions of less educated copyists. The Colonial Restrikes and Fantasies classification provides the formal collecting framework for Dickeson copies, which are valued both for their connection to the legendary Hogge Money originals and for their documentation of mid-nineteenth-century American numismatic culture and the collector demand that motivated their production. Choice examples in uncirculated condition achieve four-figure prices at major auctions, confirming sustained market interest in these carefully crafted reproductions of one of America's earliest and most romantic coin series.