Owner Comments:

This Gold Proof £5 coin (Crown) was issued for the House of Windsor Centenary.

During WWI King George V decided that the name of the Royal House, the very German sounding ‘Saxe-Coburg-Gotha’ may not have been doing his PR any favours, at a time when Britain was in the middle of the biggest war in human history, against (mainly) the Germans. Something a lot more English sounding was the order of the day. By proclamation in July 1917 the House of Windsor was established. At about the same time a lot of the Royal Family’s German titles were dropped and the rest were fully anglicised. In the years following, the King also stripped 15 of his German relations of their British titles.

Edge inscription ‘CHRISTENING OF A DYNASTY’

Obverse designer: Jody Clark

Reverse designer: Timothy Noad