Queen Anne's proclamation of 1704 was the first attempt to introduce
sterling currency to the
British West Indies, however it failed to displace the existing
Spanish dollar currency system right up until the late 1870s. In 1822, the British government coined , , and fractional 'Anchor dollars' for use in
Mauritius and the
British West Indies (but not
Jamaica). A few years later copper fractional dollars were coined for
Mauritius,
Sierra Leone, and the
British West Indies. The next attempts to introduce British
sterling silver coinage to the colonies came with an imperial order-in-council dated 1825. This move was inspired by a number of factors. The
United Kingdom was now operating a very successful
gold standard in relation to the
gold sovereign that was introduced in 1816, and there was a desire to extend this system to the colonies. In addition to this, the supply of
Spanish dollars (
pieces of eight) had been cut off as a result of the revolutions in Latin America where most of the
Spanish dollars were minted. The last
Spanish Dollar was in fact minted at
Potosi in 1825. There was now a growing desire to have a stable and steady supply of British shillings everywhere the British drum was beating. The 1825 order-in-council was largely a failure because it made sterling silver coinage legal tender at the unrealistic rating in relation to the
Spanish dollar of = 4 shillings 4 pence. It succeeded in
Jamaica,
Bermuda, and
British Honduras because the authorities in those territories set aside the official ratings and used the more realistic rating of = 4 shillings. The reality of the rating between the dollar and the pound was based on the silver content of the Spanish
pieces of eight as compared to the gold content of the British
gold sovereign. A second imperial order-in-council was passed in 1838 with the correct rating of = 4 shillings 2 pence. In the years following the 1838 order-in-council, the
British West Indies territories began to enact local legislation for the purposes of assimilating their monies of account with the British pound sterling. Gold discoveries in
Australia in 1851 drove the silver dollar out of the West Indies, but it returned again with the great depreciation in the value of silver that followed with
Germany's transition to the
gold standard between 1871 and 1873. In the years immediately following 1873, there was a fear that the
British West Indies might return to a
silver standard. As such, legislation was passed in the individual territories to demonetize the silver dollars. Even though the British coinage was also silver, it represented fractions of the
gold sovereign and so its value was based on a
gold standard. During this period, and into the nineteenth century, accounts could be kept in either dollars or sterling.
Jamaica,
Bermuda, and the
Bahamas preferred to use sterling accounts whereas
British Guiana used dollar accounts. British Guiana used dollar accounts for the purpose of assisting in the transition from the Dutch
guilder system of currency to the British pound sterling system. In the
Eastern Caribbean territories the private sector preferred to use dollar accounts whereas the government preferred to use sterling accounts. In some of the
Eastern Caribbean territories, notes were issued by various private banks, denominated in dollars equivalent to 4
shillings 2
pence. See
Antigua dollar,
Barbadian dollar,
Dominican dollar,
Grenadian dollar,
Guyanese dollar,
Saint Kitts dollar,
Saint Lucia dollar,
Saint Vincent dollar and
Trinidad and Tobago dollar. In 1946, a West Indian Currency Conference saw Barbados, British Guiana, the
Leeward Islands,
Trinidad and Tobago and the
Windward Islands agree to establish a unified decimal currency system based on a West Indian dollar to replace the current arrangement of having three different Boards of Commissioners of Currency (for Barbados (which also served the Leeward and Windward Islands), British Guiana and Trinidad & Tobago). In 1949, the British government formalized the dollar system of accounts in British Guiana and the Eastern Caribbean territories by introducing the
British West Indies dollar (BWI$) at the already existing conversion rate of per pound sterling (or = 4 shillings 2 pence). It was one of the many experimental political and economic ventures tested by the British government to form a uniform system within the British West Indies territories. The symbol "BWI$" was frequently used and the currency was known verbally as the "Beewee" (slang for British West Indies) dollar. Shortly thereafter in 1950, the British Caribbean Currency Board (BCCB) was set up in Trinidad with the sole right to issue notes and coins of the new unified currency and given the mandate of keeping full foreign exchange cover to ensure convertibility at .80 per pound sterling. Jamaica, the Cayman Islands, and the Turks and Caicos Islands were already long established users of the sterling accounts system of pounds, shillings, and pence. In 1964 Jamaica ended the legal tender status of the BWI$ and
Trinidad and Tobago withdrew from the currency union (adopting the
Trinidad and Tobago dollar) forcing the movement of the headquarters of the BCCB to Barbados and soon the "BWI$" dollar lost its regional support. In 1965, the British West Indies dollar of the now defunct
West Indies Federation was replaced at par by the Eastern Caribbean dollar and the BCCB was replaced by the
Eastern Caribbean Currency Authority or ECCA (established by the Eastern Caribbean Currency Agreement 1965).
British Guiana withdrew from the currency union the following year.
Grenada, which had used the Trinidad and Tobago dollar from 1964, rejoined the common currency arrangement in 1968. Barbados withdrew from the currency union in 1972, following which the ECCA headquarters were moved to St. Kitts. Between 1965 and 1983, the Eastern Caribbean Currency Authority issued the EC$, with banknotes from 1965 and coins from 1981. The EC$ is now issued by the
Eastern Caribbean Central Bank, based in the city of
Basseterre, in Saint Kitts and Nevis. The bank was established by an agreement (the Eastern Caribbean Central Bank Agreement) signed at
Port of Spain on 5 July 1983. The exchange rate of = £1 sterling (equivalent to the old = 4s 2d) continued until 1976 for the new Eastern Caribbean dollar. For a wider outline of the history of currency in the region see
Currencies of the British West Indies. ==Coins==