Pig Coin?

[CoinCrusader42]

I was talking to a friend recently, at a ballgame.  I know he collects coins.

He was telling me he had seen, and actually held a U.S. (Colonial times?) coin which pictured pigs on the reverse.  He said he thought the pigs depicted the wild spread of pigs on an island which was populated some of the time, and deserted some of the time.

I can't remember if the coin was minted in the 1600s or 1700s.  He said there was a series of them, and all were very valuable.

I'm not likely to see him again for a while, so thought I would ask for help.  Does anyone know anything about the pig pieces?

Thanks.

 

[scottishmoney]

They were tokens made for what were then known as the Sommer Islands, now Bermuda.  They are in the Redbook, but there are lots of copies of them.  To this day Bermuda has had a pig on the reverse of the cent.  Pigs were left on the islands by an earlier Spanish explorer, Juan de Bermudez, and they multiplied and by the time the British came along in the 17th century they made for a ready food source halfway across the Atlantic.

[CoinCrusader42]

Thanks for the answer.

I looked through my Redbook, but somehow missed the information.