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COINS FOUND BENEATH HMS VICTORY MASTDick Hanscom passed along a BBC story about the discovery of six coins and tokens under a mast of the HMS Victory. The storied ship, now preserved at Britain's National Museum of the Royal Navy, saw service in the American War of Independence and the French Revolutionary Wars and most famously was Admiral Lord Nelson's flagship at the 1805 Battle of Trafalgar. "Stepping the Mast" is a longstanding shipbuilding tradition - placing coins under the mast or in the keel as a good luck charm. See earlier articles linked below for more examples. -Editor 
Six nineteenth-century coins and tokens have been discovered beneath the foremast of HMS Victory. The find was made following the successful removal of Victory's foremast at Portsmouth Historic Dockyard. The discovery connects directly to a long-standing maritime tradition in which coins were placed beneath a ship's mast as a symbolic act, says Andrew Baines, executive director of Museum Operations at Royal Navy Museums. The coins have endured extreme conditions for 132 years, sitting beneath the fore lower mast, bearing the weight of approximately 50 tonnes of masts, yards and rigging above them. Baines added: "The placing of coins beneath a ship's mast has long been seen as a symbolic act, often associated with protection and good fortune for the vessel and her crew. "Following the earlier discovery of a single farthing beneath the main lower mast, we had hoped there might be something similar beneath the foremast.
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Here's more information from the Royal Navy News. -Editor The team has now been able to identify the six finds as:
Prolonged pressure and corrosion left them heavily degraded and difficult to identify. The coins were cleaned and x-rayed so they could be identified. This group of 1890's coins must have been placed under the mast in a renovation over 130 years ago; the ship was originally launched in 1765. -Editor
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Wayne Homren, Editor The Numismatic Bibliomania Society is a non-profit organization promoting numismatic literature. See our web site at coinbooks.org. To submit items for publication in The E-Sylum, write to the Editor at this address: whomren@gmail.com To subscribe go to: Subscribe All Rights Reserved. NBS Home Page Contact the NBS webmaster 
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