Silver shilling coin

Silver shilling coin, dated 1856. From a coin hoard consisting of thirteen coins. The hoard was found underneath the remains of a staircase during excavations of a building built as a back-to-back house on land off Addington Street in Manchester. It is believed to have been deposited in the final years of the nineteenth century.

The house amongst whose foundations the coin was found was one of eight constructed between about 1809 and 1824, which were known as Smart’s Buildings. The houses were typical of the sort of dwellings built to accommodate the growing influx of workers to industrial Manchester. Excavations have shown that the house had one downstairs room, with a flagstone floor, and that toilet facilities were shared by the occupants of these eight back to back houses.

The coins are believed to have been deposited in the location they were found together in the last years of the 19th century. This is based on the fact that the earliest coin is dated 1868 and the latest is dated 1894. The total value of the coin hoard is just over two old pounds. This amounts to just over the average weekly wage of a skilled Manchester mule spinner working in the last years of the 19th century.