Riverside was a trading station providing staple goods to a predominantly rural indigenous clientele. It was already well-established when it was purchased by James Cole, an eccentric trader who settled in Griqualand East in the 1860s and made his home at Riverside. A notorious miser whose mode of dress was more suited to the life-style of a homeless pauper, he soon accumulated a vast fortune through a string of trading stations and extensive dealings in land. At one stage he also issued his own coinage, small brass disks imprinted "James Cole.1s.Mealies", which remained in local circulation until 1935 when they became illegal.
The Strachan and Co trade tokens are the best researched and most sought after South African trade tokens by numismatists and serious Coin Collectors and Investors. They were until recently known as "South Africa's forgotten currency" but that title is now outdated as they are now widely accepted as part of the country's early numismatic History. The coins were widely used as currency for over 50 years (1874 - 1932) in Nomansland/East Griqualand, the once remote and isolated region bounded by the Drakensberg to the West, the Umzimkulu river to the north, the sea to the east and the Cape Colony to the south. They are, in fact, as numismatically important as the early Burgerspond (1874), Veld Pond (1902) and Kruger (1892 - 1900) pieces despite the fact that they were produced by a trading store for general use in a remote region of the country. Location of Strachan's stores can be seen at this link. The Strachan and Co trade tokens were first issued in the same year (1874) as the rare Mount Currie Express one Penny Stamp.