Volkart Brothers
~1872 - Maradana Mills

SPECIFICATIONS Denomination pence Alloy Brass Diameter 45 mm Thickness  mm Weight 15.60 gms Shape round Edge Plain DieAxis O° Issue
Lowsley #38 Pridmore #105

Obv. :	VOLKART BROTHERS MARADANA MILLS *   -*-   *	between two plain circles around at center below a neatly cut circular hole for suspension with a circle marked around.
Rev. :	Blank

This large token resembles Gradpass Mill token, but is of bright brass instead of Zinc, and much thicker.
Like the former token of this firm, it was struck at Winterthur, Switzerland, about the year 1872, and was also current for 18¾ cents, or 4½d.
The Maradana Mills, for which the above token was struck, were the first mills where the firm of Messrs. Volkart Brothers ever cured coffee. It may be added that this firm also owned the Mutwall Mills, but it never struck any special token for them, but used there the tokens struck for Maradana Mills, as above described.
The Mutwall Mills also employed 500 hands.

VOLKART BROTHERS. The firm of Volkart Brothers was founded in 1851 at Winterthur, Switzerland, and. Bombay, India, by the brothers S. Volkart and J. G. Volkart. The intention of the brothers was to establish direct commercial relations between India and the continent of Europe. At the outset the firms business was confined to the import of raw cotton and the export of manufactured goods to the Indies.
On the 1st October, 1857, a branch office was opened at Colombo. Its business activity embraced the export of coconut oil, coffee, cinnamon, cotton and pearls. This was later extended to all forms of Ceylon produce and a large Agency business for shipping and insurance.
As their tokens indicate, they established two oil mills, one at Grandpass and the other at Maradana. In later years the Maradana mills were moved to Mutwal.

Reference
* Coins and Tokens of Ceylon, Lieut. Col B. Lowsley, Num. Chron. Sr III Vol. XV, 1895.
* The Coins of British Commonwealth of Nations to the end of the reign of George VI 1952 Part 2 - Asian Territories by F. Pridmore Spink & Son Ltd., 1965. Tokens

The token was scanned at 600 dpi and the images are displayed at 150 dpi.
I thank Bob Lyall of UK, for the scans of this token from his collection.