½ Penny - Victoria 2nd portrait 1st type (1860–1874)

One row for each year the ½ Penny - Victoria 2nd portrait – 1st type was struck. Prices are medians of verified sold listings matched to that year from the listing: circulated is worn condition up to Extremely Fine, uncirculated is About Uncirculated or better. A count in brackets means fewer than three sales behind the figure; a grey figure marked "type" is the median across every year, shown where that year has no sale of its own yet; years with no sales yet fill in as sales are recorded. Most types have been searched year by year only since October 2026, so later years are still filling in. Use the grade table below for a price by condition across all years.

About the 1860 Halfpenny - Victoria – 1st type

The 1860 Halfpenny - Victoria – 1st type is a circulating ½ penny coin issued from 1860 to 1874, struck in bronze. It weighs 5.67g and measures 25.4mm across. Reverse design: Seated figure of Britannia right, trident in left hand, shield bearing the Union flag in right, denomination around, date in exergue, sea behind with lighthouse on left and ship on right.

Mintage figures are recorded for 14 years between 1860 and 1873, 171,186,309 coins in all. 1864 is the scarcest date, with 537,600 struck. It is no longer legal tender (withdrawn 1969), so its value is to collectors only.

Common questions

History and design

By the late 1850s the copper coinage was worn and unpopular, and Wikipedia's penny history records that in 1859 the Master of the Mint, Thomas Graham, persuaded Gladstone to replace it with lighter bronze coins. The new halfpenny, about 25 mm across and in bronze of 95% copper, 4% tin and 1% zinc according to Tony Clayton, was the first to carry its denomination. The bronze pieces were made current by a proclamation of 17 December 1860.

Coin Hunter gives 6,630,400 for 1860, then 54,118,400 and 61,107,200 as the old copper coins were withdrawn from 1861. Output then fell sharply, to just 537,600 in 1864, the lowest date of the type.

The obverse is Leonard Charles Wyon's laureate portrait of the Queen with her hair in a bun, with VICTORIA D:G: BRITT:REG:F:D: around. The Royal Mint Museum notes that the Queen and the Prince Consort personally supervised the design of Wyon's bun head penny, which shares this portrait.

The reverse, also by Wyon, shows Britannia seated right with trident and shield, a lighthouse behind her and a ship to her right, with HALF PENNY around and the date in the exergue. Clayton records that one 1861 reverse carries LCW incuse on the rock.

Varieties and errors

1860 coins have either a beaded or a toothed border, and Clayton lists ten different die pairings for 1861 alone, distinguished by the leaves and berries in the wreath and the shape of the lighthouse. A few 1862 halfpennies have a die letter A, B or C to the left of the lighthouse. From 1863 to 1872 a single die pairing was used.

Collecting notes

Low mintage is not the whole story here. CoinVarieties calls 1864 low mintage but not rare, and names 1871, with 1,075,280 struck, as a scarce date. The 1860 and 1861 varieties need Peck or Freeman to attribute, as Clayton advises.

In 1874 the portrait was revised to look older, which is the start of the later bun head halfpenny. Its copper predecessor is the Young Head copper halfpenny.