William Chaloner was a serial counterfeit coiner and confidence trickster, who was imprisoned in Newgate Prison several times and eventually proven guilty of high treason by Sir Isaac Newton, Warden of the Royal Mint.
28 Facts About William Chaloner
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William Chaloner started by forging "Birmingham Groats", then moved on to Guineas, French Pistoles, crowns and half-crowns, Banknotes and lottery tickets.
3.
William Chaloner was born in Warwickshire in 1650, the son of a weaver.
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William Chaloner's parents had great difficulty controlling him, so he was apprenticed to a nail maker in Birmingham, a town notorious for coining.
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William Chaloner soon demonstrated his ambition and, sometime in the 1680s, walked to London.
6.
William Chaloner was part of one of the many coining gangs that existed.
7.
William Chaloner was taught the subtle techniques of moulding "milled edges" and counterfeiting coins by Patrick Coffey, a goldsmith.
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Isaac Newton 8.
In 1691, William Chaloner produced French Pistoles worth about 17 shillings each, using an alloy of silver.
9.
William Chaloner was renowned in the coining community for the quality of his work and his prolific success.
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William Chaloner purchased a large house in the semi-rural suburb of Knightsbridge, rode in a carriage, bought plate and dressed like a gentleman.
11.
In mid-1692 William Blackford was condemned for passing out counterfeit guineas and denounced Chaloner, so he absconded until after Blackford was hanged.
12.
William Chaloner recruited Thomas Holloway and bought a house in Egham, Surrey, where the noise of coining and hot moulding machines would not be suspicious.
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An inventive coiner, William Chaloner taught Thomas Holloway a new method of coining, using small, easily concealed stamps.
14.
William Chaloner claimed that they coined false guineas, struck debased blanks sent in from outside, and sent out stamps for coining, and regularly produced underweight coin.
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William Chaloner named other coiners, Thomas Carter, John Abbot, and Patrick Coffee, including his own alias, "Chandler".
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William Chaloner claimed that many mint employees were corrupt and all were too specialised to spot security flaws in other people's areas.
17.
William Chaloner claimed an extensive anti-Jacobite role, including the capture of another press and the seizure of thirty-six different titles.
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William Chaloner claimed to have discovered that a merchant, John Comyns, was remitting money to France.
19.
William Chaloner immediately turned "King's evidence", surrendered his unused stock, named other conspirators to give him credibility, and exposed a major fraud against the bank, one presumably in which he was himself involved.
20.
An inventive counterfeiter, William Chaloner had taught Aubrey Price how to counterfeit the new exchequer bills by altering the denominations after removing the old ink using a liquid that William Chaloner had invented.
21.
Price was named by William Chaloner, tried at the Old Bailey, and condemned to death for 'counterfeiting an excheque'.
22.
In 1699 William Chaloner allegedly told a prisoner in Newgate that:.
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In 1698, William Chaloner engraved a copperplate of tickets for the lottery on the "malt duty".
24.
William Chaloner immediately accused Thomas Carter, a longtime colleague, of engraving the plate and offered to surrender it in exchange for immunity.
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William Chaloner used a comprehensive network of spies and informants, taking many statements from all his old contacts.
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Isaac Newton 26.
William Chaloner had to conduct his own defence without prior knowledge of Newton's case, evidence or witnesses, and no "presumption of innocence".
27.
Elizabeth Holloway declared how William Chaloner had bribed her husband, the coiner Thomas Holloway, to flee to Scotland and avoid giving evidence at the 1697 trial.
28.
Catherine Carter, wife of Thomas Carter who had twice previously been named and blamed by William Chaloner, testified to William Chaloner's skill as a forger and his role in the lottery scam.