Golden Hind Galleon Sir Francis Drake Half-Penny Great Britain Authentic Coin Money for Jewelry and Craft Making

Golden Hind Galleon Sir Francis Drake Half-Penny Great Britain Authentic Coin Charm for Jewelry and Craft Making

Obverse: Young laureate bust of HM Queen Elizabeth II facing right, legend around.
Lettering: +ELIZABETH·II·DEI·GRATIA·REGINA·F:D:
Translation: Elizabeth the Second by the Grace of God Queen Defender of the Faith

Reverse: Three-masted ship (Sir Francis Drake's Golden Hind) sailing left, denomination above, date below

Features
Issuer United Kingdom
Queen Elizabeth II (1952-date)
Type Standard circulation coin
Years 1954-1970
Value 1/2 Penny = 1/24 Shilling (1/480)
Currency Pound sterling (1158-1970)
Composition Bronze
Weight 5.67 g
Diameter 25.4 mm
Thickness 1.3 mm
Shape Round
Orientation Medal alignment ↑↑
Demonetized 08-01-1969
Number N# 5824
References KM# 896, Sp# 4158

Wikipedia:
Golden Hind was a galleon captained by Francis Drake in his circumnavigation of the world between 1577 and 1580. She was originally known as Pelican, but Drake renamed her mid-voyage in 1578, in honour of his patron, Sir Christopher Hatton, whose crest was a golden hind (a female red deer). Hatton was one of the principal sponsors of Drake's world voyage. A full-sized, seaworthy reconstruction exists in London, on the south bank of the Thames.

Queen Elizabeth I partly sponsored Sir Francis Drake as the leader of an expedition intended to pass around South America through the Strait of Magellan and to explore the coast that lay beyond. The queen's support was advantageous; Drake had official approval to benefit himself and the queen, as well as to cause the maximum damage to the Spaniards. This eventually culminated in the Anglo–Spanish War. Before setting sail, Drake met the queen face-to-face for the first time and she said to him, "We would gladly be revenged on the King of Spain for divers injuries that we have received."

The explicit object was to "find out places meet to have traffic." Drake, however, acted as a privateer, with unofficial support from Elizabeth. Golden Hind is described as a "mid-16th-century warship during the transition from the carrack to the galleon," and weighed about 120 tons. He first named his flagship Pelican, but renamed her Golden Hind on 20 August 1578 to honour his patron, Sir Christopher Hatton, whose family crest was a golden hind. He set sail in December 1577 with five small ships, manned by 164 men, and reached the Brazilian coast in early 1578.

On 1 March 1579, now in the Pacific Ocean, off the coast of Ecuador, Golden Hind challenged and captured the Spanish galleon Nuestra Señora de la Concepción. This galleon had the largest treasure captured to that date: over 360,000 pesos (equivalent to around £480m in 2017). The treasure took six days to transship and included 26 tons of silver, half a ton of gold, porcelain, jewellery, coins, and jewels.

On 26 September 1580, Francis Drake sailed his ship into Plymouth Harbour with 56 of the original crew of 80 left aboard. The ship was unloaded at Saltash Castle nearby, where the treasure offloading was supervised by the Queen's guards.[9] The final treasure also included six tons of cloves from the Spice Islands, at the time worth their weight in gold.[10] Elizabeth herself went aboard Golden Hind, which was then permanently at Deptford on the south bank of the Thames, where she had requested it be placed on permanent display as the first 'museum ship'. There, she shrewdly asked the French ambassador to bestow a knighthood on Drake. Over half of the proceeds went to the crown - her share of the treasure came to at least £160,000: "enough to pay off her entire government debt and still have £40,000 left over to invest in a new trading company for the Levant. Her return, and that of other investors, was more than £47 for every £1 invested, or 4,700%."

After Drake's circumnavigation, Golden Hind was maintained for public exhibition at the dockyard at Deptford, London. The ship remained there from 1580 to around 1650, 45 years after Elizabeth had died, before the ship eventually rotted away and was broken up. In 1668, the keeper of the stores at Deptford, John Davies of Camberwell, had the best remaining timber of Golden Hind made into a chair which was presented to the Bodleian Library at the University of Oxford, where it remains (with a replica in the Great Hall, Buckland Abbey, Devon, Drake's home and now maintained by the National Trust).

A table, known as the cupboard, in the Middle Temple Hall, London is also reputed to have been made from the wood of Golden Hind. Upon the cupboard is placed the roll of members of Middle Temple, which new members sign when they are called to the Bar. The ship's lantern was hung in the vestibule of Middle Temple Hall, but was destroyed during the Second World War.