Maritime Newp

bosox

1862 Nova Scotia cent in PCGS AU-53 and ICCS AU-50. Records from the Royal Mint indicate a mintage of 800,000 NS cents for 1861 and 1,000,000 NS cents for 1862. However, the 1862 Nova Scotia cent is very scarce. In the 2005 pop report ICCS had graded four pieces in AU, or higher. PCGS lists nine pieces in AU, or higher. Obviously some of those are the same, crossgraded coins. The most likely explanation is that most of the NS cents minted in 1862 were dated 1861.

This piece is interesting in that it was struck with a broken die. The very bottom of the obverse (below the effigy) was minted by a fragment of the die that had broken off and was wedged into place, causing a distinctly raised area on the coin, but with the denticles quite obvious. Consequently the coin has a very weakly struck corresponding area on the reverse (at SCOTIA).

shirohniichan

Cool!

I wonder if the Royal Mint has records indicating how many dies were made and when the coins were struck. That might give us a clue as to when the coins dated 1862 were struck.

Walter Breen looked through US Mint records and found that most 1875-CC trade dollars were struck early in the year. In December of 1875 an additional 20,000 coins were minted, leading him to conclude that those with the type II reverse were probably those 20,000 (out of a mintage of 1,573,700). That would explain why the type II reverse is so scarce.

If the Royal Mint records are available, a similar seach may clear up some Maritime mysteries.