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Australia George VI

1943-D Sixpence

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The 1943-D Sixpence was struck at the Denver Mint with a total mintage of 8,000,000. In the same year a further 4,000,000 pieces were struck at the San Francisco Mint. The Denver variety can be differentiated from the others by a small 'D' mint-mark located above the date on the reverse. This variety is the most affordable in the entire George VI series. Mint-state examples of this type typically skew toward higher grades than the rest of this series with PCGS population reports showing more than a dozen MS66 examples, more than double its nearest competitor in the series.

Denver 'D' mint-mark on the reverse of the 1943-D Sixpence.

The high overall mintage of the sixpence in 1943 was a response against a major shortage of both silver and copper coinage. One of the key reasons for this storage was the mass arrival of United States soldiers in Australia from the Middle Eastern theatre. These troops, along with a general increase in public spending, created an unprecedented demand for coins. The Melbourne and Perth Mint simply could not make supply match demand so a deal was struck with the United States. Under President Roosevelt's Lend-Lease Policy the United States agreed to provide Australia with a substantial quantity of silver coins. Australia guaranteed to then return an equal amount of silver after the war.

President Theodore Roosevelt had created the extensive Lend-Lease Policy in 1941 as a way to assist allied forces during the Second World War. The program allowed the United States to provide war materials included but not limited to ammunition, aeroplanes, and food that could then be paid for "...in kind or property, or any other direct or indirect benefit which the President deems satisfactory." The program proved essential to the allied war effort with the total value of the aid reaching $49,100,000,000. (Encyclopaedia Britannica, 2017)