A few years later copper fractional dollars were coined for Mauritius, Sierra Leone, and the British West Indies.

The next move to introduce British sterling silver coinage to the colonies came with an imperial order-in-council dated 1825.

The 1825 order-in-council was largely a failure because it made sterling silver coinage legal tender at the unrealistic rating in relation to the Spanish dollar of $1 = 4 shillings and 4 pence.

In the years immediately following 1873, there was a fear that the British West Indies might return to a silver standard.

In some of the Eastern Caribbean territories, notes were issued by various private banks, denominated in dollars equivalent to 4 shillings 2 pence.

In 1946, a West Indian Currency Conference saw Barbados, British Guiana, the Leeward Islands, Trinidad and Tobago and the Windward Islands agree to establish a unified decimal currency system based on a West Indian dollar to replace the current arrangement of having three different Boards of Commissioners of Currency (for Barbados (which also served the Leeward and Windward Islands), British Guiana and Trinidad & Tobago).

In 1950, the British Caribbean Currency Board (BCCB) was set up in Trinidad[3] with the sole right to issue notes and coins of the new unified currency and given the mandate of keeping full foreign exchange cover to ensure convertibility at $4.80 per pound sterling.

Grenada rejoined the common currency arrangement in 1968 having utilized the Trinidad and Tobago dollar from 1964.

The EC$ is now issued by the Eastern Caribbean Central Bank, based in the city of Basseterre, in Saint Kitts and Nevis.

Coins were introduced in 1955 in denominations of 1⁄2, 1, 2, 5, 10, 25 and 50 cents, minted under the name of "British Caribbean Territories, Eastern Group".

Issues were made at Antigua, Barbados, British Guiana, Dominica, Grenada, St. Kitts, St. Lucia, St. Vincent, and Trinidad and Tobago.

In 1950, the first issues made for all the participating colonies, in the name of the "British Caribbean Territories, Eastern Group".

The 1950-1951 issues bore the portrait of King George VI, with those between 1953 and 1964 bearing that of Queen Elizabeth II.

In March 1965, the East Caribbean Currency Authority (ECCA) was founded following the withdrawal from the British Caribbean Currency Board of British Guiana and Trinidad and Tobago to establish their respective central banks.