"As to the cut down large cents in the last couple of E-Sylum installments - If the two round pieces shown in the images were done contemporary to the times (circa 1860's and the Civil War) and are not more recent works, then they are examples of copperhead badges which were carried in the North by confederate sympathizers who did not support the war and were used as identifiers with like minded people at the time. There is a fair amount of information available online by searching copperhead badges or copperhead coins/tokens. Genuine examples are collectible as early copper exonumia or civil war tokens, but later reproductions are out there and dedicated reproductions are also. They are another item of history pertaining to Civil War times."

"During the Civil War, the so-called copperheads were regarded as snakes-in-the grass by soldiers fighting and dying in far-off fields to sanction liberty for all. The oppositional view was that fighting and funding the war was, in effect, an infringement on their personal liberty, their free choice. To emphasize their position, badges were fashioned from large cents, cutting them down in order to accentuate the "copper head" of Lady Liberty. As evidenced by the news stories in my article, many of these were worn as pinned badges; this, resulting in serious public clashes. I suspect that, in order to avoid violent consequences, many a copperhead or "copper head" preferred to carry their badge in their pocket. Looking at Dave Schenckman's piece, I strongly suspect that someone once gave that particular copperhead badge a good punch-in-the-nose!"

Duuuhh! How could I manage to forget that we'd discussed this topic before? Bill Groom submitted a great article on these in 2019, and I'll republish an except here - follow the link below for the complete piece. -Editor