Stalin's "Death Sentence" Coins: Box of 4 Russian Silver Coins (Four-Coin Box)

In 1930, in the midst of an economic crisis, Soviet leader Joseph Stalin decided that all hard-currency silver coins in circulation would be replaced by base-metal copper/nickel coins. This met with resistance, as people began to hoard the silver coins like these: 10 and 20 kopeks from the late Romanov period (1867-1917), 15 kopeks from the short-lived Russian Soviet Federated Socialist Republic (1923-24), and 20 kopeks from the Soviet Union. -Dissatisfied with the efficiency of the mass confiscation, he went to his get-to strategy for problem solving: mass murder. Stalin wrote to his protégé, Molotov, ”The agents ”probably clamped down on a few cashiers and let it go at that... It is thus important to a) fundamentally purge the Finance [Ministry] and Gosbank (Central Bank) bureaucracy. b) Definitely shoot two or three dozen [bureaucrats]..., including several dozen common cashiers; c) continue [KGB] operations throughout the USSR that are aimed at seizing“ the silver. The Kopeks in this set are among the few, rare survivors of this period. The Soviets never again issued a circulating silver coin.

Packaging: wood box.

Images are representative of the type and general grade. The date, mint, color, toning, and exact coins received may vary unless the listing explicitly says the actual lot is shown.