Owner Comments:
Middlesex Skidmore's Churches and Gates DH #670
Obverse: A south view of Christchurch, Southwark CHRIST . CHURCH SURRY . BUILT. 1737. Ex: JACOBS. in small letters
Reverse: The Skidmore cypher - PSCO in script, 1797 below DEDICATED . TO . COLLECTORS . OF . MEDALS. & COINS . surrounding
Edge: Plain
Diesinker: Benjamin Jacobs
Manufacturer: Paul Skidmore
Weight: 11.43g
Rarity: Common
The parishes of Christchurch and St. Saviour’s Southwark were created by an Act of Parliament in 1682 and Christchurch was built on the west side of Blackfriars Road, London on the Surrey side of the Thames. The building was taken down about 1737 and the church depicted was built in its place. The church was destroyed in the London Blitz in WW2 and rebuilt following the war.
The family business of the token manufacturer Peter Skidmore was an iron foundry at 15 Coppice Row in Clerkenwell with a shop at No. 123, High Holborn. Skidmore realized that there was a market for tokens as the genuine tradesmen's pieces of the time were very keenly collected as they were issued. As well as making genuine tradesmens' tokens to order, he also made pennies and halfpennies for sale to collectors of the time - especially series of Buildings Tokens for London.
One of a set of 120 pieces - each portraying a well known church in or around London.
Atkins: Surrey 21
Bt. Gary Sriro