As to the speculation that a two cent piece planchet was used to make this piece, that can be easily proven or disproved by doing an elemental test for the tin and zinc that transform copper into bronze.
It sure does not look like bronze.
I speculate that it is a slight underweight 104 grain heavy copper planchet of the type used up until 1795. Too bad it does not have a lettered edge which would have saved us all a lot of bother.
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.
A few things to keep in mind. To do this properly the overlay coin needs to be resized, rotated, and positioned. All with precision. There is bound to be small error. Also, the images are perfectly round. Are the coins?
has anyone here taken the time to have images of all the known small eagle reverse dies/marriages.
i do not have the images of the burned into memory so i can't say offhand how close or not each die is from one another. unless they are very similar to each other, it should be possible to at the very least, narrow down the possibilities although i can't imagine there are too many marriages to sort through.
I studied it carefully with lighting and magnification prior to selling it. Although it was already certified, it did not seem like bronze, it looked like copper. In addition, to me it appeared to be a Half Cent blank.
mikebyers.com Dealer in Major Mint Errors, Die Trials & Patterns - Author of NLG Best World Coin Book World's Greatest Mint Errors - Publisher & Editor of minterrornews.com.
If there is any doubt that the reverse working die is not the same that was used on the B-14 small eagle reverse (with off-center bust), an overlay with the reverse of this CoinFacts image 1795 B-15 centered bust, which uses a different reverse, will show dramatic differences with the berries and leaves on the OP P-34 - because these are hand punched and engraved details that will be different on each of the small eagle reverse dollars:
Robert Scot: Engraving Liberty - biography of US Mint's first chief engraver
This is my theory of the most likely scenario that created the OP P-34, that uses die state, engraver history, and a similar known dollar pattern:
I am assuming the reverse die is the same used on 1795 B-14 Off-Center Bust, along with three other DM's, the last in 1798. The die state in P-34 indicates an early state before lapping, as some of the details such as the leaves are microscopically wider and longer than 1795 B-14 SP66. Actually, I don't believe this reverse die was completely finished, including final basining and lapping that will effectively lower the relief of devices.
The obverse die is not known on 1795 dollar coins (numeral position is different). Some details appear unfinished - the highest drapery line is strong bust tip to shoulder, but the internal drapery lines are weak or non existent compared to 1795 SP66, because these lines are unfinished on this hub and obverse die. Other details appear unfinished.
Sculptor John Eckstein provided to the Mint in September of 1795 "two models for dollars." Why? On Whitsonday, 1764, (May 15) Robert Scot and Carnagy McLean formed a copperplate engraving and "plastier" modelling partnership at Niddry Wynd in Edinburgh. Their work included plaster architectural busts of classical figures such as Apollo. After the partnership ended, Scot continued with copperplate and McLean with plaster modelling. It was Scot's knowledge of what could be done with plaster models (not de Saussure), and Eckstein was not only a world-class sculptor, but was one of two artists in Philadelphia who was proficient in life/death masks as a plaster modeller. This was an expensive design change for the Mint, and it had to be right after the 1792-94 design failures. Scot had introduced the drapery on US Mint coinage in July of 1795 with the half eagle, in accordance with descriptions and illustrations by Scot in 1791, along with Grecian profile dimensions and proportions described and illustrated by Scot also in 1791. (No 1795 evidence exists for Stuart/Bingham involvement).
I believe the P-34 copper piece is design work in progress for the new draped bust dollar design, similar to the 1794 J-18/P-27 No Stars dollar pattern. Both are unfinished obverse dies of a new dollar design that were not used on coins, and both of the reverse dies were used on coins. I think the importance of this piece is right up there with the 1794 J-18 (assuming the above is right!!). Scot's 1764 partnership was supplied to me by Edinburgh researchers of that city's archives, this is the first time I have posted about it.
Here are again the two items in question to compare.
Robert Scot: Engraving Liberty - biography of US Mint's first chief engraver
Part of several pages of documents from Edinburgh archives. Scot's name was spelled both with one T and two TT's in these documents, indicating that he was changing the spelling (he was born Robert Scott).
Robert Scot: Engraving Liberty - biography of US Mint's first chief engraver
From my set of the first encyclopedia published in the United States (1789-1804). Scot engraved most illustrations until his Mint appointment. Read through the_ Drapery_ section and compare to the Draped Bust design, it follows exactly. Scot provided the drapery illustrations. The P-34 is directly related to these instructions, as the drapery lines are not finished "4. The great folds must be drawn first, and then stroked into the lesser ones; and great care must be taken that they do not cross each other improperly. 5. Folds in general should be large, and as few as possible."
Why is credit still given of the Draped Bust design to others who have ZERO evidence of involvement, when there is so much evidence of Scot's experience with classical design, draperies, and Grecian profiles? The neo-classical figures used on early US coins were constructed using exact measurements of proportions of Grecian profiles.
Robert Scot: Engraving Liberty - biography of US Mint's first chief engraver
i'm not ignoring what has been posted, i'm just not sure if the OP coin has been proven to be from the b14 bb51 o/c bust marriage. so i will just ask this. if it is not struck from the b14, then it could be one of a couple/few dozen different marriages, right?
At least from my standpoint, the P-34 is not the B-14 BB51 die marriage, but I believe it does use the reverse die, which Reiver called 1795 Reverse K. I don't think anyone has said the obverse die of P-34 is the same as B-14.
I think that all small eagle dollar reverses can be found on Coinfacts, there are not many 1795-1798. If overlays were done with these (except 95 rev K), they would show dramatic differences with P-34. Even the berry counts are different.
The overlay shows exact berry positioning with P-34 and 1795 Reverse K (B-14 reverse ONLY). This could not be accomplished even if the engraver tried. Only a splash (as we call it in tooling) as in a casting could duplicate the positioning, which the Mint did not do.
Why are you not convinced the reverse dies were the same with P-34 and B-14? Some of the differences that you noted earlier are from lapping, which can change the length of a detail, but not angularity.
Robert Scot: Engraving Liberty - biography of US Mint's first chief engraver
As to the obverse die not being a known die, there are anecdotal reports of dies breaking during hardening and becoming useless. This might be a die trial struck before such a catastrophic failure.
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.
@Nysoto said:
Why are you not convinced the reverse dies were the same with P-34 and B-14? Some of the differences that you noted earlier are from lapping, which can change the length of a detail, but not angularity.
I can’t see lapping explaining this.
Andy Lustig
Doggedly collecting coins of the Central American Republic.
Visit the Society of US Pattern Collectors at USPatterns.com.
The N serif is different, and I agree that lapping would not change it to that extent.
However, the overlay shows a leaf and berry match. These are hand engraved/punched on all small eagle coinage dies, with different placement on each die. It could be a hubbing experiment for the new design (except letters, numbers), which the Mint had tried on other denominations.
Robert Scot: Engraving Liberty - biography of US Mint's first chief engraver
Fascinating discussion of a unique enigmatic U.S. coin!
mikebyers.com Dealer in Major Mint Errors, Die Trials & Patterns - Author of NLG Best World Coin Book World's Greatest Mint Errors - Publisher & Editor of minterrornews.com.
if anyone can think of a better way to run down the marriage of this error other than to brute force comparing it to every small eagle reverse marriage, please speak up. i'll do the overlay for 96, 97 and 98 but so far after doing the 96, it looks like the error was struck in such a placement as to prohibit stars from showing, which for a normal obv bust dollar, does not seem to be possible so far, which would only leave the 1 marriage of the b14 bb51, right? no others can be far enough left to exclude the stars? obviously the date is going to be an issue as well depending on bust and date placement.
edited to add: images of hesselgesser coins and pcgs TV.
edited to add 2nd time: i think someone made a post to the effect of some hanky panky going on with mixing up of dies during the process of striking this and other pieces, isn't a far stretch of the imagination. so it is possible to have the obv die o/c with one of the other or perhaps unknown reverse? unless someone has an eidetic memory or has simply worked to memorize all the reverses and can differentiate them from each other on recall. so the only way i know to prove that this is a known reverse is the brute force method of comparing it to all small eagle reverses or at least ones where the leaf points to that particular area, as shown above. obviously leaf comparison on reverses is a staple of attribution of 18th and 19th century coins.
just when i was about to put down the gauntlet, i remembered aspie started that numis reference thread and that lilolme linked all those nnp digital books and then i checked to see if there were early dollars and then i checked to see if QDB had included all the marriages with images. so my hand was kinda forced at that point.
just when you are about to give up/move on and stuff falls right in your lap, grin and bear it and accept.
so here she is in all her glory, pretty much the quickest most efficient way to get these brute forced. no auction links, no set registry, no coin facts. just scrolling pages, still a bit painful but worked quite well.
@Nysoto said: @LanceNewmanOCC , that is a good analysis, but can you identify the reverse dies used on multiple die marriages?
on multiple marriages for now is ok. i just wanted to prove the reverse die is known but finding one with the N in that position next to that leaf cluster is proving difficult, unless i overlooked something so far, which is possible.
first is to verify that image above with the reverese comps covers all business strike marriages and then next, onto the proofs. tbh, this may even be one of those rare situations where pattern reverses may have to be looked at?
for the record, there are better people than me with bust dollars of any kind to do this analysis but we kinda have it in motion and i have a onery curious nature and since so many people have chimed in that are very good numismatists and we have the information needed at our finger tips, more or less for my part, i'm kinda in it to win it at this point.
so if anyone sees errors/additions/suggestions with any of my work, please speak up. this is not one of those situations to be bashful.
if at the very least, all we do is prove the coin doesn't match any known bs, proof, pattern obv/rev or some variation thereof, that in itself is an acceptable answer. we aren't there just yet though.
i'm gonna be mostly unreliable on when i get around to working on the next step, whatever it may be, proofs, patterns, more obv/rev comparison. hoping someone else comes along with a eureka moment or at least some grunt work to say what is the next effective/efficient step. ya know?
The small eagle reverse die analysis provided by @LanceNewmanOCC shows similar leaf and berries only to the above working die and P-34. All other draped bust small eagle dollar reverse dies are significantly different in berry placement and leaves.
The close-up provided by @MrEureka proves that die lapping can't explain differences with P-34 and 1795 B-14/BB-51 indicating they were not the same die.
The very similar if not identical leaf and berry placement with P-34 and 1795 B-14/BB-51 (as indicated in the reverse overlay) could be explained by an experimental small eagle hub that includes the eagle, ribbon, leaves, and berries, but not lettering. This hub could have only made P-34 and 1795 B-14/BB-51 (and all usages) reverse working dies. All other reverse dies were sunk with a different hub that does not include leaves and berries.
Comments, criticisms, corrections to the above are welcome.
Robert Scot: Engraving Liberty - biography of US Mint's first chief engraver
I am adding some recent research to my last post possibility of an "experimental small eagle hub" to show the scenario is not only viable, but it was to be expected during that time period. Bill Eckberg wrote a series of three articles in Penny-Wise (7/2020, 1/2021, 7/2021), that explained the development of copper reverses from full hand-engraving of reverse working dies, to a "marginally successful experiment" of a complete reverse working hub for 1794 half cents, a partially hubbed large cent reverse in 1796, to full hubbing of large cent wreath reverses by mid-1798. I had also published research in 2007 of an experiment in hubbed dentils for half dollars and $10 Eagle heraldic reverses. All of these efforts to place more details on the master dies and hubs was to reduce engraving time on working dies.
Chief Engraver Robert Scot also wrote of the engraving process in a December, 1794 report to Congress. Scot's "Original Die" is now a master die. Scot also described the difficulty of this complex process with many hubs and dies failing for various reasons. An excerpt from an image I took in 2010 at the Philadelphia NARA archives, Record Group 104:
Robert Scot: Engraving Liberty - biography of US Mint's first chief engraver
@Nysoto said:
I am adding some recent research to my last post possibility of an "experimental small eagle hub" to show the scenario is not only viable, but it was to be expected during that time period. Bill Eckberg wrote a series of three articles in Penny-Wise (7/2020, 1/2021, 7/2021), that explained the development of copper reverses from full hand-engraving of reverse working dies, to a "marginally successful experiment" of a complete reverse working hub for 1794 half cents, a partially hubbed large cent reverse in 1796, to full hubbing of large cent wreath reverses by mid-1798. I had also published research in 2007 of an experiment in hubbed dentils for half dollars and $10 Eagle heraldic reverses. All of these efforts to place more details on the master dies and hubs was to reduce engraving time on working dies.
Chief Engraver Robert Scot also wrote of the engraving process in a December, 1794 report to Congress. Scot's "Original Die" is now a master die. Scot also described the difficulty of this complex process with many hubs and dies failing for various reasons. An excerpt from an image I took in 2010 at the Philadelphia NARA archives, Record Group 104:
.
that is good to read, along with the rest of your astute research and posts. it may let us/me off the hook a bit striving to run these dies down, knowing the realistic possibility of never finding a match, despite the desire and ability to do so.
perhaps i'll just hold off until i digest all of this.
Could these be counterfiet dies as was found to be the case with the 1838 half Judd-83a? That would seem an outside possibility if both dies are unique. This one is especially challenging without being able to match up definitely letter and number punches. It seems what is present doesn't match up optimally. This one looks mint made to me, but of course counterfiets were common throughout these time periods. I personally am more unsure if the 1796 pattern is not a counterfiet.
@GoBust said:
Could these be counterfiet dies as was found to be the case with the 1838 half Judd-83a? That would seem an outside possibility if both dies are unique. This one is especially challenging without being able to match up definitely letter and number punches. It seems what is present doesn't match up optimally. This one looks mint made to me, but of course counterfiets were common throughout these time periods. I personally am more unsure if the 1796 pattern is not a counterfiet.
What method was available to counterfeiters before 1863 that could have created this piece?
Andy Lustig
Doggedly collecting coins of the Central American Republic.
Visit the Society of US Pattern Collectors at USPatterns.com.
BTW, here’s a pic of the J-83a Chuck mentioned. Notice the crude die work? Not that it proves anything, but that’s what I would expect of a contemporary counterfeit of the era.
Andy Lustig
Doggedly collecting coins of the Central American Republic.
Visit the Society of US Pattern Collectors at USPatterns.com.
I think counterfeits started about 400 BC Andy. But I take your concern. There of course were pre-1850 struck counterfeits world wide. I think the coin in hand looked like a mint product to me as I said, but it certainly is an odd duckling. I'm enjoying the thread and the attempts to find the dies for the piece. Does the hub match for lady liberty, can we say that definitively? The punch for the lettering remains problematic. I own the 1838 Judd-83a half that was thought to be genuine until relatively recently. It would have been very difficult to discern if the outside part of the coin with the lettering and dates was removed. Of course it didn't match a mint made die either in retrospect.
mikebyers.com Dealer in Major Mint Errors, Die Trials & Patterns - Author of NLG Best World Coin Book World's Greatest Mint Errors - Publisher & Editor of minterrornews.com.
mikebyers.com Dealer in Major Mint Errors, Die Trials & Patterns - Author of NLG Best World Coin Book World's Greatest Mint Errors - Publisher & Editor of minterrornews.com.
Comments
As to the speculation that a two cent piece planchet was used to make this piece, that can be easily proven or disproved by doing an elemental test for the tin and zinc that transform copper into bronze.
It sure does not look like bronze.
I speculate that it is a slight underweight 104 grain heavy copper planchet of the type used up until 1795. Too bad it does not have a lettered edge which would have saved us all a lot of bother.
A few things to keep in mind. To do this properly the overlay coin needs to be resized, rotated, and positioned. All with precision. There is bound to be small error. Also, the images are perfectly round. Are the coins?
Here's what I got.
Lance.
great work on the overlay.
has anyone here taken the time to have images of all the known small eagle reverse dies/marriages.
i do not have the images of the burned into memory so i can't say offhand how close or not each die is from one another. unless they are very similar to each other, it should be possible to at the very least, narrow down the possibilities although i can't imagine there are too many marriages to sort through.
I studied it carefully with lighting and magnification prior to selling it. Although it was already certified, it did not seem like bronze, it looked like copper. In addition, to me it appeared to be a Half Cent blank.
Thanks so much for the excellent overlay, Lance!
If there is any doubt that the reverse working die is not the same that was used on the B-14 small eagle reverse (with off-center bust), an overlay with the reverse of this CoinFacts image 1795 B-15 centered bust, which uses a different reverse, will show dramatic differences with the berries and leaves on the OP P-34 - because these are hand punched and engraved details that will be different on each of the small eagle reverse dollars:
PCGS guarantees it is struck on copper planchet.
Did they certify it's on 1/2 Cent blank ?
This is my theory of the most likely scenario that created the OP P-34, that uses die state, engraver history, and a similar known dollar pattern:
I am assuming the reverse die is the same used on 1795 B-14 Off-Center Bust, along with three other DM's, the last in 1798. The die state in P-34 indicates an early state before lapping, as some of the details such as the leaves are microscopically wider and longer than 1795 B-14 SP66. Actually, I don't believe this reverse die was completely finished, including final basining and lapping that will effectively lower the relief of devices.
The obverse die is not known on 1795 dollar coins (numeral position is different). Some details appear unfinished - the highest drapery line is strong bust tip to shoulder, but the internal drapery lines are weak or non existent compared to 1795 SP66, because these lines are unfinished on this hub and obverse die. Other details appear unfinished.
Sculptor John Eckstein provided to the Mint in September of 1795 "two models for dollars." Why? On Whitsonday, 1764, (May 15) Robert Scot and Carnagy McLean formed a copperplate engraving and "plastier" modelling partnership at Niddry Wynd in Edinburgh. Their work included plaster architectural busts of classical figures such as Apollo. After the partnership ended, Scot continued with copperplate and McLean with plaster modelling. It was Scot's knowledge of what could be done with plaster models (not de Saussure), and Eckstein was not only a world-class sculptor, but was one of two artists in Philadelphia who was proficient in life/death masks as a plaster modeller. This was an expensive design change for the Mint, and it had to be right after the 1792-94 design failures. Scot had introduced the drapery on US Mint coinage in July of 1795 with the half eagle, in accordance with descriptions and illustrations by Scot in 1791, along with Grecian profile dimensions and proportions described and illustrated by Scot also in 1791. (No 1795 evidence exists for Stuart/Bingham involvement).
I believe the P-34 copper piece is design work in progress for the new draped bust dollar design, similar to the 1794 J-18/P-27 No Stars dollar pattern. Both are unfinished obverse dies of a new dollar design that were not used on coins, and both of the reverse dies were used on coins. I think the importance of this piece is right up there with the 1794 J-18 (assuming the above is right!!). Scot's 1764 partnership was supplied to me by Edinburgh researchers of that city's archives, this is the first time I have posted about it.
Here are again the two items in question to compare.
Part of several pages of documents from Edinburgh archives. Scot's name was spelled both with one T and two TT's in these documents, indicating that he was changing the spelling (he was born Robert Scott).
From my set of the first encyclopedia published in the United States (1789-1804). Scot engraved most illustrations until his Mint appointment. Read through the_ Drapery_ section and compare to the Draped Bust design, it follows exactly. Scot provided the drapery illustrations. The P-34 is directly related to these instructions, as the drapery lines are not finished "4. The great folds must be drawn first, and then stroked into the lesser ones; and great care must be taken that they do not cross each other improperly. 5. Folds in general should be large, and as few as possible."
Why is credit still given of the Draped Bust design to others who have ZERO evidence of involvement, when there is so much evidence of Scot's experience with classical design, draperies, and Grecian profiles? The neo-classical figures used on early US coins were constructed using exact measurements of proportions of Grecian profiles.
i'm not ignoring what has been posted, i'm just not sure if the OP coin has been proven to be from the b14 bb51 o/c bust marriage.
so i will just ask this. if it is not struck from the b14, then it could be one of a couple/few dozen different marriages, right?
@LanceNewmanOCC said:
At least from my standpoint, the P-34 is not the B-14 BB51 die marriage, but I believe it does use the reverse die, which Reiver called 1795 Reverse K. I don't think anyone has said the obverse die of P-34 is the same as B-14.
I think that all small eagle dollar reverses can be found on Coinfacts, there are not many 1795-1798. If overlays were done with these (except 95 rev K), they would show dramatic differences with P-34. Even the berry counts are different.
The overlay shows exact berry positioning with P-34 and 1795 Reverse K (B-14 reverse ONLY). This could not be accomplished even if the engraver tried. Only a splash (as we call it in tooling) as in a casting could duplicate the positioning, which the Mint did not do.
Why are you not convinced the reverse dies were the same with P-34 and B-14? Some of the differences that you noted earlier are from lapping, which can change the length of a detail, but not angularity.
As to the obverse die not being a known die, there are anecdotal reports of dies breaking during hardening and becoming useless. This might be a die trial struck before such a catastrophic failure.
I can’t see lapping explaining this.
Doggedly collecting coins of the Central American Republic.
Visit the Society of US Pattern Collectors at USPatterns.com.
The N serif is different, and I agree that lapping would not change it to that extent.
However, the overlay shows a leaf and berry match. These are hand engraved/punched on all small eagle coinage dies, with different placement on each die. It could be a hubbing experiment for the new design (except letters, numbers), which the Mint had tried on other denominations.
since ikeigwin did 1/2, i'll do the other. never know when something may spark a thought/give some useful info.
he is right about it being a challenge matching up the different diameter images.
thanks to Hesselgesser and pcgs TV for the image(s).
Fascinating discussion of a unique enigmatic U.S. coin!
if anyone can think of a better way to run down the marriage of this error other than to brute force comparing it to every small eagle reverse marriage, please speak up. i'll do the overlay for 96, 97 and 98 but so far after doing the 96, it looks like the error was struck in such a placement as to prohibit stars from showing, which for a normal obv bust dollar, does not seem to be possible so far, which would only leave the 1 marriage of the b14 bb51, right? no others can be far enough left to exclude the stars? obviously the date is going to be an issue as well depending on bust and date placement.
edited to add: images of hesselgesser coins and pcgs TV.
edited to add 2nd time: i think someone made a post to the effect of some hanky panky going on with mixing up of dies during the process of striking this and other pieces, isn't a far stretch of the imagination. so it is possible to have the obv die o/c with one of the other or perhaps unknown reverse? unless someone has an eidetic memory or has simply worked to memorize all the reverses and can differentiate them from each other on recall. so the only way i know to prove that this is a known reverse is the brute force method of comparing it to all small eagle reverses or at least ones where the leaf points to that particular area, as shown above. obviously leaf comparison on reverses is a staple of attribution of 18th and 19th century coins.
ok it is someone elses turn.
just when i was about to put down the gauntlet, i remembered aspie started that numis reference thread and that lilolme linked all those nnp digital books and then i checked to see if there were early dollars and then i checked to see if QDB had included all the marriages with images. so my hand was kinda forced at that point.
just when you are about to give up/move on and stuff falls right in your lap, grin and bear it and accept.
so here she is in all her glory, pretty much the quickest most efficient way to get these brute forced. no auction links, no set registry, no coin facts. just scrolling pages, still a bit painful but worked quite well.
WHAT SAY YOU!
@LanceNewmanOCC , that is a good analysis, but can you identify the reverse dies used on multiple die marriages?
on multiple marriages for now is ok. i just wanted to prove the reverse die is known but finding one with the N in that position next to that leaf cluster is proving difficult, unless i overlooked something so far, which is possible.
first is to verify that image above with the reverese comps covers all business strike marriages and then next, onto the proofs. tbh, this may even be one of those rare situations where pattern reverses may have to be looked at?
for the record, there are better people than me with bust dollars of any kind to do this analysis but we kinda have it in motion and i have a onery curious nature and since so many people have chimed in that are very good numismatists and we have the information needed at our finger tips, more or less for my part, i'm kinda in it to win it at this point.
so if anyone sees errors/additions/suggestions with any of my work, please speak up. this is not one of those situations to be bashful.
if at the very least, all we do is prove the coin doesn't match any known bs, proof, pattern obv/rev or some variation thereof, that in itself is an acceptable answer. we aren't there just yet though.
i'm gonna be mostly unreliable on when i get around to working on the next step, whatever it may be, proofs, patterns, more obv/rev comparison. hoping someone else comes along with a eureka moment or at least some grunt work to say what is the next effective/efficient step. ya know?
The overlay that @lkeigwin provided shows the OP subject P-34 reverse with 1795 B-14/BB-51.
The 1795 B-14/BB-51 reverse working die was also used on:
1796 B-1, BB-66
1796 B-2, BB-63
1796 B-3, BB-62 (Reiver questioned existence)
1797 B-2, BB-72
1798 B-2, BB-81
The small eagle reverse die analysis provided by @LanceNewmanOCC shows similar leaf and berries only to the above working die and P-34. All other draped bust small eagle dollar reverse dies are significantly different in berry placement and leaves.
The close-up provided by @MrEureka proves that die lapping can't explain differences with P-34 and 1795 B-14/BB-51 indicating they were not the same die.
The very similar if not identical leaf and berry placement with P-34 and 1795 B-14/BB-51 (as indicated in the reverse overlay) could be explained by an experimental small eagle hub that includes the eagle, ribbon, leaves, and berries, but not lettering. This hub could have only made P-34 and 1795 B-14/BB-51 (and all usages) reverse working dies. All other reverse dies were sunk with a different hub that does not include leaves and berries.
Comments, criticisms, corrections to the above are welcome.
I am adding some recent research to my last post possibility of an "experimental small eagle hub" to show the scenario is not only viable, but it was to be expected during that time period. Bill Eckberg wrote a series of three articles in Penny-Wise (7/2020, 1/2021, 7/2021), that explained the development of copper reverses from full hand-engraving of reverse working dies, to a "marginally successful experiment" of a complete reverse working hub for 1794 half cents, a partially hubbed large cent reverse in 1796, to full hubbing of large cent wreath reverses by mid-1798. I had also published research in 2007 of an experiment in hubbed dentils for half dollars and $10 Eagle heraldic reverses. All of these efforts to place more details on the master dies and hubs was to reduce engraving time on working dies.
Chief Engraver Robert Scot also wrote of the engraving process in a December, 1794 report to Congress. Scot's "Original Die" is now a master die. Scot also described the difficulty of this complex process with many hubs and dies failing for various reasons. An excerpt from an image I took in 2010 at the Philadelphia NARA archives, Record Group 104:
.
that is good to read, along with the rest of your astute research and posts. it may let us/me off the hook a bit striving to run these dies down, knowing the realistic possibility of never finding a match, despite the desire and ability to do so.
perhaps i'll just hold off until i digest all of this.
Just making sure we have 2 sets of TrueViews
Could these be counterfiet dies as was found to be the case with the 1838 half Judd-83a? That would seem an outside possibility if both dies are unique. This one is especially challenging without being able to match up definitely letter and number punches. It seems what is present doesn't match up optimally. This one looks mint made to me, but of course counterfiets were common throughout these time periods. I personally am more unsure if the 1796 pattern is not a counterfiet.
What method was available to counterfeiters before 1863 that could have created this piece?
Doggedly collecting coins of the Central American Republic.
Visit the Society of US Pattern Collectors at USPatterns.com.
BTW, here’s a pic of the J-83a Chuck mentioned. Notice the crude die work? Not that it proves anything, but that’s what I would expect of a contemporary counterfeit of the era.
Doggedly collecting coins of the Central American Republic.
Visit the Society of US Pattern Collectors at USPatterns.com.
I think counterfeits started about 400 BC Andy. But I take your concern. There of course were pre-1850 struck counterfeits world wide. I think the coin in hand looked like a mint product to me as I said, but it certainly is an odd duckling. I'm enjoying the thread and the attempts to find the dies for the piece. Does the hub match for lady liberty, can we say that definitively? The punch for the lettering remains problematic. I own the 1838 Judd-83a half that was thought to be genuine until relatively recently. It would have been very difficult to discern if the outside part of the coin with the lettering and dates was removed. Of course it didn't match a mint made die either in retrospect.
This 1795 $1 in copper is the cover coin for issue 64 of Mint Error News Magazine:
https://minterrornews.com/issue64.pdf
Wow, a lot of errors traded hands recently.
One of your best issues !!!
Thanks LindyS!😁