Green’s Dictionary of Slang

cripple n.¹

a sixpence.

1785, 1788, 1796		Grose Classical Dict. of the Vulgar Tongue n.p.: Cripple, six pence, that piece being commonly much bent and distorted.
1789		G. Parker Life’s Painter 178: Sixpence. A bender, crook, or cripple.
1796		Sporting Mag. Aug. VIII 253/1: For a cripple, you shall get ‘as drunk as David’s sow.’.
1811		Lex. Balatronicum.
1819		‘One of the Fancy’ Tom Crib’s Memorial to Congress 25, n.: A bandy or cripple, a sixpence.
1823		Egan Grose’s Classical Dict. of the Vulgar Tongue.
1855		Yokel’s Preceptor 29: Cripple, Sixpence.
1862		E. de la Bédollière Londres et les Anglais 313/2: crimple [sic], [...] pièce de six pence, ces pièces élaut souvent bosselées.
1864, 1867, 1870		Hotten Sl. Dict.
1881		Morn. Bulletin (Rockhampton, Qld) 18 July 2/6: For our next coin in value twenty names are found, viz: - ‘sixpence,’ ‘bandy,’ ‘broder,’ ‘cripple.’ ‘downer,’ ‘fiddler.’ ‘fyebuck,’ ‘half-hog,’ ‘kick,’ ‘lord of the manor,’ ‘pig,’ ‘pot,’ ‘say saltee,' ’sprat,’ ‘snid,’ ‘simon,’ ‘sow's baby,’ ’tanner,’ tester,’ and ‘tizzy’.
1885		Household Words 20 June 155: The sixpence is a coin more liable to bend than most others, so it is not surprising to find that several of its popular names have reference to this weakness. It is called a bandy, a ‘bender,’ a cripple [F&H].
1905		Exeter & Plymouth Gaz. 4 Feb. 5/6: A sixpence [...] has been a ‘tester‘ [...] a ‘lord-of-the-manor,’ a ‘bender’ and a ‘cripple’’.
1919		Smith’s Wkly (Sydney) 7 June 9/6: Slang of Money [...] Sixpence is a ‘sprat,’ ‘zack,’ ‘tanner,’ ‘fizzy,’ ‘bender,’ ‘cripple’’.
1925		Western Mail (Perth) 28 May 21/1: [from Daily Mail, London] Twenty or thirty years ago a sixpenny bit used still to be known as a kick or a bender. Two or three decades before that it was a [...] cripple.