HOPKINS, STEPHEN. 1707-1785.

HOPKINS, STEPHEN. 1707-1785.
Manuscript document signed ("Step Hopkins, C. Just") ordering the arrest of William Reynolds for counterfeiting coins, 2 pp, 194 x 157 mm, South Kingston, October 2, 1770, old seal to upper corner, some soiling, some tears at folds.

Stephen Hopkins, signer of the Declaration of Independence, here as Chief Justice of the Rhode Island Supreme Court, signs a warrant for the arrest of William Reynolds, for "making, uttering & passing in Payment certain false & counterfeit Coin ... knowing the same to be such." Reynolds was a silversmith working in conjunction with Samuel Casey and others, and one of 15 men arrested as part of the ring. Reynolds was branded and cropped atop Tower Hill before a crowd of 3000 people. See Scott, Counterfeiting in Colonial Rhode Island, (Providence, 1960), p 54-55.