Need Help Identifying this "coin" and what happened to it
I received this coin in a auction along with 4 Matron Head Large Cents. I know the quality is very poor and my curiosity about it has gotten to me but I couldnt pass the lot up for $20. The coin weighs 7.1 grams. On the obverse side I can only make out six six pointed stars, the profile of what looks like on the Indian head cent with the letters FP??? on the headband. The reverse side is what gets me. The picture is not reversed-all the lettering on the coin is reversed. Impression from another coin perhaps??? Someone trying to counterfeit a coin??? The lettering is all indented and the rings or chain is raised. The major crack across the coin I have no ideal about. ONE CENT is on the coin not WE ARE ONE. UNITED STATES and not UNITED STATES of AMERICA so I am not even positive it is a US coin.
Comments
That looks like an attempt to create a coin, and it failed - badly. Not a U.S. coin. Cheers, RickO
Could be a Fugio cent with a large cent pressed into each side.
I kind of agree on the not a US coin but the Indian Head profile throws me. It almost matches the Indian Head cent perfectly. Some things match US coins some don't. Don't think any value to it just curious about it. I don't know why someone would go to the trouble to make a cent into a large cent. The coin has age to it so nothing was done recently. With coin in hand and under a scope I can make out a 17. Not sure if its 1817 or 17xx.
I haven't found a large cent that would make that impression.
It looks like someone was fooling around with some old coins and then ended up pitching it into the dirt.
Anyone with any ideal what the coin might be or what coins made the impression?
Not an Indian Head cent. Looks like a Coronet Head obverse impression.
Lance.
That was my first thought. You can see the fugio cent design and both sides have the mirror image of a large cent impressed into each side---an obverse on one side and a reverse on the other side. I'm guessing that someone had trouble spending the fugio cent in the early 1800's and wanted to make it into a large cent so he could spend it.
Worry is the interest you pay on a debt you may not owe.
"Paper money eventually returns to its intrinsic value---zero."----Voltaire
"Everything you say should be true, but not everything true should be said."----Voltaire
I agree with @cmerlo1, coins were squeezed together. The original coin is a fugio cent. I believe the mirrored portrait impression is a matron head large cent, not some type of indian. I can see how the corrosion makes it look like a headdress. The reverse mirrored impression is from a draped bust large cent
Thanks for the info. Unusual coin even tho it is badly worn. First one I had ran across like it.
My thoughts were someone in the 1800's was trying to make their own coins. I havent done any research on counterfeiting coins in the 1800's.
Basically my first thoughts on the piece.
I wonder how late Fugio cents did circulate alongside large cents, assuming that they did at all?
I read somewhere that they circulated until the small cents came out in 1857 which resulted in the hobby of coin collecting making major gains in popularity. Based on the many well worn surviving fugio cents, it is quite believable.
Worry is the interest you pay on a debt you may not owe.
"Paper money eventually returns to its intrinsic value---zero."----Voltaire
"Everything you say should be true, but not everything true should be said."----Voltaire
Some interesting stuff
Counterfeiters began to shave the sides of coins to collect the valuable metal. Before the coins were removed from circulation, sometime during the early 1700’s, counterfeiters had managed to reduce the weight and value of the original coin by at least half. Have you ever wondered why quarters and dimes have ridged sides? It was during this time that practice was developed, to make it more noticeable when a coin had been clipped.
On April 14, 1865, one of President Abraham Lincoln's last acts was signing a bill authorizing the Secret Service. Ironically President Lincoln signed the legislation on the same day which he would later be assassinated on, by John Wilkes Booth and the Secret Service would not be being assigned to help protect the United States President until 36 years after.
When the Secret Service was signed into law, its mission was to suppress currency counterfeiting. This was in part a response of the rampant money counterfeiting that was happening after the Civil War. It was estimated that at the time around one third to half of the money in the United States was counterfeit.
Also a very detailed document can be located at https://doc.uments.com/s-coins-counterfeiting-and-the-state-in-the-19th-century.pdf
I see a Fugio cent as the host coin. Notice that under the reverse impression of the coronet head there are numerals 17 in the proper orientation of the tops of the numerals to the rim.