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Auction: 25021 - The Simpson Collection of Hiberno-Norse and Irish Coinage
Lot: 301

Ireland, CO. ANTRIM, Lisburn, Edward Smyth, Twopence, 1736, uniform facing left, * EDWD. SMYTH * below, rev. fine line inscription, edge plain, 9.25g, 12h (D.22; Seaby TD14), minor bagmarking, softness to tops of devices, very fine, scarce

Provenance

The John Noel Simpson Collection of English, Irish and Hiberno-Norse Coins



'Edward Smyth of Lisburn is the token issuer about whom most is known at present. This is fortunate in several ways. For a start Smyth was a member of the established church, which most of the others certainly were not. Circumstances and institutions in eighteenth century Ireland make it much more probable that documentary evidence will have been created, and survive, about people of this religious affiliation than about dissenters or catholics, who were excluded from many official functions. Smyth was born in either 1700 or 1693 and graduated from Trinity College, Dublin in 1721 with a law degree, becoming an honoury DLS in 1747 47 He was MP for Lisburn from 1743 until 1759. Appointed a commissioner for the militia in 1756 for both counties Antrim and Down, he was attorney-at-law for the diocese of Conor and registrar of schools for both Down and Conor. At his death he was able to leave three full and two separate half townlands, other land, including some in Ardglass with three small castles on it, various urban freeholds, his 'old mansion at Derryaghy' and, with other smaller bequests, £1000. Settlement had already been made for his daughter. This prosperity was not just a phenomenon of his declining years. He had acquired property in Lisburn, then something of a boom town, from the break-up of the Conway estate. He leased 1800 plantation acres from Clotworthy O'Neill, all in the 1730s 48 Amongst all this there is no sign of direct involvement in trade, which indeed would have been seen as rather inappropriate for a man of his station. The device on his token is that of a gentleman's crest, the restraint of which contrasts with the whimsy displayed on many of the others. Smyth does, however, appear on the peripheries of the dispute about stamping linen in 1762.' (Heslip, BNJ 1992, p.172)

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Sold for
£3,000

Starting price
£210