Old Money

Old Money

Yesterday I said I’d explain the old pounds, shillings and pence I grew up with in the late 1934 to the introduction of decimalisation. First of all in common currency there were £1 notes which were 20/- (twenty shillings), 2x10/- notes, 10 florins (2/- coins), 8xhalf crowns (2/6 or two shillings and six pence coins), 240 pennies, 480 ha’pennies or halfpennies and 960farthings or quarters of a penny. A shilling was worth 12 pence and you can work out how many halfpennies or farthings. There was also a crown worth 5/- but I never knew of them actually being used as currency. Likewise with guineas worth £1 and 1/-. There were also silver sixpenny pieces which were popular for putting in Christmas puddings, and two different threepenny pieces. Pre-decimal currency was a lot of fun and the subject of quite a few Maths lessons.

Mind you all those coins had a value then. You could get quite a few sweets for a penny and even lemon sherbets were two for a penny. Even as late as 1954 when I started in my first job as a teacher my monthly salary was £28 and my digs cost £1/10 (thirty shillings) per week for bed, breakfast, evening meal and my washing done.

I’ll explain about Miss Bennett’s where I got my book tomorrow.

Don’t forget to have a look at the catalogues in my shop at  http://www.kleeneze.com/distributors/2449/MRS-THEODORA-COCHRANE?returnUrl=/