Using Mint facilities for private refining - John Vaughan & friends
RogerB
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The following agreement allowed Philadelphia merchant John Vaughan to use the Mint to refine silver bullion, provided he paid all expenses and redeposited the resulting gold and silver for coinage. Lawyer-members will enjoy the wordy, repetitive and contorted language. The rest of us can snooze.
Articles of Agreement made this twenty [sic] day of March Anno Domini 1796 between Elias Boudinot, Director of the Mint of the United States, for the time being, of the one part & John Vaughan, of the City of Philadelphia, merchant of the other part.
Whereas the said John Vaughan, as agent for, and in the name of James Swan, hath deposited on the said Mint, a quantity of bullion, which has since been discovered to contain a considerable quantity of gold; and whereas it is agreed to withdraw the said deposit in order that the said bullion may be separated for the advantage of the depositor; but the said John Vaughan is under a difficulty to obtain proper furnaces and utensils for the purpose of separation, altho’ he has engaged a professional man for that purpose; and also whereas the said John Vaughan has obtained the President’s approbation of his having the use of the Works, Tool & Materials belonging to the Mint, necessary for separating said metals, on condition that the said john Vaughan shall make a compensation to the United States for the value of the articles so used, as far as the same may be consumed, destroyed, or injured in the separation aforesaid, and shall also replace the 2000 lbs. of Salt Petre issued form the public store for this operation, within two years, or when demanded by the Treasury or War Department of the United States, or on failure thereof, pay for the same at the price which the Government shall be obliged to give at the time of such failure to replace the same.
Now it is hereby agreed, between the parties aforesaid, that the said Elias Boudinot, Director for the time being, shall suffer Joseph Richardson, who is employed by the said Joh Vaughan to perform the process of separation aforesaid, to have the use of the Works, Tools and Materials belonging to the Mint that may be necessary for the purpose aforesaid, together with the necessary assistance of workmen employed in the Mint for the purpose of separating the said metals agreeably to the President’s directions aforesaid. And the said John Vaughan doth hereby agree for himself, his Executors, Administrators, and Assigns, and for all persons interested in the said bullion, that he will well and truly pay to the Treasurer of the said Mint, on the order or warrant of the Director of said Mint, a full compensation for the value of the Works, Tools, and Materials used in the process aforesaid, as far as the same in that process shall be consumed, destroyed or injured, together with the wages of the workmen, the whole to be ascertained and determined by the said Joseph Richardson by a certificate in writing under his hand when the said separation shall be finished. And that he, the said John Vaughan shall and will also well and truly replace the public store in Philadelphia the 2000 lbs. of Salt Petre issued for the use of the process aforesaid within two years from the date hereof, or sooner if demanded by the Secretary of the Treasury or War Department, and in case of failure, shall and will pay such a sum of money as will be sufficient to purchase the like quantity of 2000 lbs. of Salt Petre as aforesaid. And the said John Vaughan further doth oblige himself and those concerned in said bullion and redeposit all the gold and silver contained therein (when separated) for coinage in the said Mint of the United States in the usual manner.
In witness whereof the parties to these presents have interchangeably set their hand and seals the day and year first above written.
/signed/ John Vaughan
/signed/ Elias Boudinot, Director
Sealed and delivered in the presence of:
Nathanial Thomas
Isaiah Hough
Comments
Are you also familiar with the related "Petition of John Vaughan" of 1798?
That's when John Vaughan sued the government for cheating him when he had his bullion minted into coins. The Mint act of 1792 prescribed the fineness of the silver to be 0.8924, but the Mint struck the coins with a fineness of 0.9000. The result was that the Mint delivered less face value of newly-minted coins than Vaughan should have received, and ultimately he recovered over $2,000 when the case was decided in 1799.
If Joe Blow deposited a quantity of silver to be coined and it turned out to contain a recoverable percentage of gold, did the Mint not normally refine that gold out?
I'll post Vaughan's petition later.
RE: Refining. Presumably. And also the agreement notes the deposited silver "has since been discovered to contain a considerable quantity of gold" suggests something unusual.
How much silver could be refined using 2,000 lb of potassium nitrate?
Is this a Mensa question?
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Fellas, leave the tight pants to the ladies. If I can count the coins in your pockets you better use them to call a tailor. Stay thirsty my friends......
"The refinement of silver by saltpeter is done while melting silver in a crucible in a vented furnace. When the silver has melted it is known as being in bath ; with the silver in this state, you throw saltpeter into the crucible and let everything melt together well. This is called brazing the material in bath .
"Remove the crucible from the fire and pour at an angle into a small tub filled with water where the silver becomes ball-like, provided that you are stirring the water with a stick or in some other way. If the water is still, the silver conglomerates.
"You also must melt the silver three times while adding saltpeter and a little borax to it each time. And the third time, let the crucible cool without touching it, and pour it into an ingot mold. Then break it open and you will find a fine silver residue. The slag, which is on top, is composed of the saltpeter and impurities that were in the silver.
"Use two ounces of saltpeter and a lot of borax calcined by the dregs of the silver. Repeat as long as the slag still has color.
"You can refine gold by using potassium nitrate (saltpeter) in the same manner as refining silver, except that you must not use borax because it ruins the color of the gold. Gold mixed with silver cannot be refined by saltpeter."
[Malouin, Paul-Jacques. "Refinement of metals." The Encyclopedia of Diderot & d'Alembert Collaborative Translation Project. Translated by Audra Merfeld-Langston and Emily A. Weigel. Ann Arbor: Michigan Publishing, University of Michigan Library, 2015. http://hdl.handle.net/2027/spo.did2222.0003.174. Originally published as Affinage des métaux, Encyclopédie ou Dictionnaire raisonné des sciences, des arts et des métiers, Vol. 1, p.160 (Paris, 1751).]
RE: "Is this a Mensa question?"
No. It's a "Medusa" question....
Are there any documented cases of Mint employees' wives filing complaints for loss of consortium on days following the use of saltpetre for refining?
May you have something there!
@RogerB states in the OP:
"And that he, the said John Vaughan shall and will also well and truly replace the pubic store in Philadelphia the 2000 lbs. of Salt Petre issued for the use of the process aforesaid"
John Vaughan was a wine merchant, and was also treasurer of the American Philosophical Society (APS) from 1791 until his death in 1841.
The John Vaughan papers are at the APS, about 850 letters. Vaughan was described by the APS as having "enjoyed a reputation as a charitable man" such as the founding of the Philadelphia Institution for the Instruction of the Blind. He worked to expand the APS collections including the library, through requests for private donations.
The APS stated that Vaughan's fifty years of service to the Society "were overshadowed by the discovery after his death that he had mingled the Society's funds with his own. As a result, the Philosophical Society never published a biographical memoir of its long-term librarian and treasurer."
https://search.amphilsoc.org/collections/view?docId=ead/Mss.B.V462-ead.xml#SeriesI:Correspondence
I really enjoy these historical letters... both for the history and the style of writing. I often wondered if these people conversed with the same wordiness that they committed to paper. Cheers, RickO