@denga said:
First, a minor correction. The 1799 letter is not exactly where I said it is. One has
to go to the year 1796 at RG 104 entry 3 before Book B appears for use.
Rittenhouse keeps mentioning that the small presses were operated differently.
Documentation would be nice but even if true does not mean that the larger
presses had feeding tubes. Boudinot would have said so had that been the case.
I have seen nothing from the 1790s about differences in striking small coins
versus large.
And yet another case of deliberate confusion on the part of Rittenhouse: “...and
given the coining rate in 1794 through early 95, the US Mint [presses] did have
some sort of feed.” I don’t know the coining rate per press during this time period
and neither does Rittenhouse as we have no daily coinage records of the kind that
exist for April through July 1793. It is clear, however, from the 1794 copper delivery
records that at least two presses were striking cents and probably more; this fact
alone negates the Rittenhouse claim about feeding tubes in 1794. One could not,
for example, deliver 12,200 cents on July 8 and 40,000 the next day from just one
press.
There is documentation that I previously published and discussed with you when we were working together. You have simply forgotten.
More importantly, you are once again misreading the records to fit what you have decided. You did that with the Bullion Journals skipping the words “To” and “By.” You saw how that turned out. Words are important, as is punctuation. People don’t put that stuff in for the fun of it. The part between the commas is the exception, exactly as Boudinot said and the other records support his statement.
And, there are ways to estimate the striking rates given what we have. The estimates are pretty rough, but good enough for the purposes of understanding the press operation.
Here is a transcription of the letter dated April 22, 1799 from Director Boudinot to Mathew Boulton. Commas are as in the original.
Philadelphia
April 22, 1799
TO: Mathew Boulton
Duplicate via Ship Douglass
Triplicate via Ship Delaware, Capt. Clay
Sir,
The foregoing is a duplicate of my last to you with the difference of covering the second Sett of Exchange therein mentioned. Since which, as late as Friday I was honored with your favor of the 24 December which gave me great satisfaction as I could not account for your long silence. I am much pleased with your account of the improvement you are making in the art of coining & especially in preventing counterfeiters meeting with success, as they are the Vermin of Society. If you should be of opinion that any thing you chose to communicate under the strongest obligation of secrecy would be of public service, you may depend on my integrity on this head. I should esteem it a very particular mark of your confidence and benevolence if you would give me any instructions relative to the principles of the machinery used in coining. For altho we are on the small scale, yet to us as a young people, it is a matter of great consequence as our own specie bears a proper proportion to our numbers. We use the common presses with levers that go by manual labour, excepting that as to small coin & cents, the press is fed by means of a hopper instead of being put under by hand. We strike about half a million of dollars in gold & silver per annum and as many planchets of copper as we can get. It would have been very pleasing to me to have had our coin struck by abler artists, if policy & the national prejudices permitted it, but this was found impracticable.
The greatest difficulty I have experiences is in the dies. Much of this proceeds from want of good steel. If you send me a ton of the best kind, it would greatly oblige me indeed. Your friendly & generous communication relative to the hardening of dies, demands my most cordial thanks. We have practiced hitherto on the same principles. Excepting the oil or tallow in the last part of the business, which in my opinion will be a great improvement. I am much obliged by your resolution to ship me ten tons of planchets, the bills now sent will fully reimburse you, and I will be careful to keep you in cash for all you may send hereafter. I beg you will not let any opportunity slip to keep us well supplied, as I have been sometime wholly idle as to the coinage of copper: and as to the price, if we get the copper as cheap as other people, it is all we can expect.
We are making some endeavours to obtain copper in this country, particularly at Schuyler’s Mines in New Jersey – there is nothing in the way by water. I hope when out North Western Country is opened a little more, that we shall be able to supply your market with ore, as there is an immense body of it on the upper part of Lake Erie.
I would be much obliged to you for an estimate of the expense of a steam engine equal to twelve horses continually at work. I should be glad to know what sort of crucibles you find the best, and to have a sample of a few dozen of a good sort.
I have had it in contemplation to request you to let me have an estimate of the expense of a Mint complete in all its parts, but on a small scale, to be executed by you & sent out here with full direction for putting it up, including the engine, etc., etc. If you could favor me with such an estimate, accompanying it with such explanations as would enable me to induce Congress to agree to it, I should be much obliged, as it might render the business more expeditious & easy in future. I am led to this request by the hint you have given me of your making one for the Emperor of Russia.
I am etc.
/signed/ Elias Boudinot
[E-3 Journals to 1837\Journal 1793-1824\1793-1815 pp.282-25 – 284-27. Hyphenated page numbers are a result of multiple re-bindings of the originals and fair copies.]
@RogerB said:
Here is a transcription of the letter dated April 22, 1799 from Director Boudinot to Mathew Boulton. Commas are as in the original.
Philadelphia
April 22, 1799
TO: Mathew Boulton
Duplicate via Ship Douglass
Triplicate via Ship Delaware, Capt. Clay
Sir,
... We use the common presses with levers that go by manual labour, excepting that as to small coin & cents, the press is fed by means of a hopper instead of being put under by hand.......
Gentlemen,
Let us please have peace. There are more important things in the world to get upset about.
As to the phrase above, I have struggled to parse, diagram and/or otherwise interpret it, using the standards beaten into me by the good nuns of my grade and high schools, and it is my ruling that the phrase is manifestly ambiguous. I can see either interpretation. Had the writer submitted that document to Sister Gerald, my 12th grade English teacher, she would have beaten him to death and burned the corpse.
My gut feeling is that the writer meant to say that the small coin(s) and cents were struck on presses that were fed by means of a hopper, but I could not prove it, or prove otherwise. I would suggest that you both sit down and have a nice, relaxing cup of tea, and contemplate the usage of the phrase: "....appears to say...." when expressing your opinions.
TD
Numismatist. 50 year member ANA. Winner of four ANA Heath Literary Awards; three Wayte and Olga Raymond Literary Awards; Numismatist of the Year Award 2009, and Lifetime Achievement Award 2020. Winner numerous NLG Literary Awards.
I see that RogerB has posted the 1799 letter. It may be convoluted but the meaning is clear. Small coins were struck using a feeding tube. Larger planchets were hand fed into the press. If all coins had been struck using feeding tubes there would have been no need whatsoever for the comment by Boudinot.
It is also clear from Rittenhouse’s last remarks that he simply invented the claim that feeding tubes were used in the 1794–1795 time period he mentions. The delivery records are available in the March 1963 Numismatic Scrapbook Magazine and readers with access to this article may judge Rittenhouse’s accuracy for themselves.
@RogerB said:
Here is a transcription of the letter dated April 22, 1799 from Director Boudinot to Mathew Boulton. Commas are as in the original.
Philadelphia
April 22, 1799
TO: Mathew Boulton
Duplicate via Ship Douglass
Triplicate via Ship Delaware, Capt. Clay
Sir,
... We use the common presses with levers that go by manual labour, excepting that as to small coin & cents, the press is fed by means of a hopper instead of being put under by hand.......
Gentlemen,
Let us please have peace. There are more important things in the world to get upset about.
As to the phrase above, I have struggled to parse, diagram and/or otherwise interpret it, using the standards beaten into me by the good nuns of my grade and high schools, and it is my ruling that the phrase is manifestly ambiguous. I can see either interpretation. Had the writer submitted that document to Sister Gerald, my 12th grade English teacher, she would have beaten him to death and burned the corpse.
My gut feeling is that the writer meant to say that the small coin(s) and cents were struck on presses that were fed by means of a hopper, but I could not prove it, or prove otherwise. I would suggest that you both sit down and have a nice, relaxing cup of tea, and contemplate the usage of the phrase: "....appears to say...." when expressing your opinions.
TD
Tom,
I’m not really upset about the interpretation. However, I do take umbrage with having work that I did nearly 30 years ago, and now have discovered is incorrect, represented as the last statement on the presses.
For the record, I read the records (I might have even found a few previously unknown), I made the connections, I published the original conclusions, and they are wrong. Hey, that’s the risk we take interpreting fragments. A new fragment comes along and blows the whole messs out of the water.
TD's 12th grade English teacher, Sister Gerald, is presently living in the "Rosary Row Retirement Nunnery" where the staff affectionately refer to her as "Sisyphus' Torment."
Comments
There is documentation that I previously published and discussed with you when we were working together. You have simply forgotten.
More importantly, you are once again misreading the records to fit what you have decided. You did that with the Bullion Journals skipping the words “To” and “By.” You saw how that turned out. Words are important, as is punctuation. People don’t put that stuff in for the fun of it. The part between the commas is the exception, exactly as Boudinot said and the other records support his statement.
And, there are ways to estimate the striking rates given what we have. The estimates are pretty rough, but good enough for the purposes of understanding the press operation.
Here is a transcription of the letter dated April 22, 1799 from Director Boudinot to Mathew Boulton. Commas are as in the original.
Philadelphia
April 22, 1799
TO: Mathew Boulton
Duplicate via Ship Douglass
Triplicate via Ship Delaware, Capt. Clay
Sir,
The foregoing is a duplicate of my last to you with the difference of covering the second Sett of Exchange therein mentioned. Since which, as late as Friday I was honored with your favor of the 24 December which gave me great satisfaction as I could not account for your long silence. I am much pleased with your account of the improvement you are making in the art of coining & especially in preventing counterfeiters meeting with success, as they are the Vermin of Society. If you should be of opinion that any thing you chose to communicate under the strongest obligation of secrecy would be of public service, you may depend on my integrity on this head. I should esteem it a very particular mark of your confidence and benevolence if you would give me any instructions relative to the principles of the machinery used in coining. For altho we are on the small scale, yet to us as a young people, it is a matter of great consequence as our own specie bears a proper proportion to our numbers. We use the common presses with levers that go by manual labour, excepting that as to small coin & cents, the press is fed by means of a hopper instead of being put under by hand. We strike about half a million of dollars in gold & silver per annum and as many planchets of copper as we can get. It would have been very pleasing to me to have had our coin struck by abler artists, if policy & the national prejudices permitted it, but this was found impracticable.
The greatest difficulty I have experiences is in the dies. Much of this proceeds from want of good steel. If you send me a ton of the best kind, it would greatly oblige me indeed. Your friendly & generous communication relative to the hardening of dies, demands my most cordial thanks. We have practiced hitherto on the same principles. Excepting the oil or tallow in the last part of the business, which in my opinion will be a great improvement. I am much obliged by your resolution to ship me ten tons of planchets, the bills now sent will fully reimburse you, and I will be careful to keep you in cash for all you may send hereafter. I beg you will not let any opportunity slip to keep us well supplied, as I have been sometime wholly idle as to the coinage of copper: and as to the price, if we get the copper as cheap as other people, it is all we can expect.
We are making some endeavours to obtain copper in this country, particularly at Schuyler’s Mines in New Jersey – there is nothing in the way by water. I hope when out North Western Country is opened a little more, that we shall be able to supply your market with ore, as there is an immense body of it on the upper part of Lake Erie.
I would be much obliged to you for an estimate of the expense of a steam engine equal to twelve horses continually at work. I should be glad to know what sort of crucibles you find the best, and to have a sample of a few dozen of a good sort.
I have had it in contemplation to request you to let me have an estimate of the expense of a Mint complete in all its parts, but on a small scale, to be executed by you & sent out here with full direction for putting it up, including the engine, etc., etc. If you could favor me with such an estimate, accompanying it with such explanations as would enable me to induce Congress to agree to it, I should be much obliged, as it might render the business more expeditious & easy in future. I am led to this request by the hint you have given me of your making one for the Emperor of Russia.
I am etc.
/signed/ Elias Boudinot
[E-3 Journals to 1837\Journal 1793-1824\1793-1815 pp.282-25 – 284-27. Hyphenated page numbers are a result of multiple re-bindings of the originals and fair copies.]
... We use the common presses with levers that go by manual labour, excepting that as to small coin & cents, the press is fed by means of a hopper instead of being put under by hand.......
Gentlemen,
Let us please have peace. There are more important things in the world to get upset about.
As to the phrase above, I have struggled to parse, diagram and/or otherwise interpret it, using the standards beaten into me by the good nuns of my grade and high schools, and it is my ruling that the phrase is manifestly ambiguous. I can see either interpretation. Had the writer submitted that document to Sister Gerald, my 12th grade English teacher, she would have beaten him to death and burned the corpse.
My gut feeling is that the writer meant to say that the small coin(s) and cents were struck on presses that were fed by means of a hopper, but I could not prove it, or prove otherwise. I would suggest that you both sit down and have a nice, relaxing cup of tea, and contemplate the usage of the phrase: "....appears to say...." when expressing your opinions.
TD
I see that RogerB has posted the 1799 letter. It may be convoluted but the meaning is clear. Small coins were struck using a feeding tube. Larger planchets were hand fed into the press. If all coins had been struck using feeding tubes there would have been no need whatsoever for the comment by Boudinot.
It is also clear from Rittenhouse’s last remarks that he simply invented the claim that feeding tubes were used in the 1794–1795 time period he mentions. The delivery records are available in the March 1963 Numismatic Scrapbook Magazine and readers with access to this article may judge Rittenhouse’s accuracy for themselves.
Tom,
I’m not really upset about the interpretation. However, I do take umbrage with having work that I did nearly 30 years ago, and now have discovered is incorrect, represented as the last statement on the presses.
For the record, I read the records (I might have even found a few previously unknown), I made the connections, I published the original conclusions, and they are wrong. Hey, that’s the risk we take interpreting fragments. A new fragment comes along and blows the whole messs out of the water.
TD's 12th grade English teacher, Sister Gerald, is presently living in the "Rosary Row Retirement Nunnery" where the staff affectionately refer to her as "Sisyphus' Torment."
At least the pictures are interesting
Most of the text absolutely turgid.
a.k.a "The BUFFINATOR"