Bust Quarter Experts: What's going on on the back of this 1819 CBQ?

doh

Doubling on the 5? Is this a variety?

commoncents05

Looks like it was repunched.

-Paul

Quarternut

The 5 in the denomination was repunched, more than likely because the first time it was punched too high and too close to the 2. This would be enough of an enigma for any working die, but another quirk was that another period was punched in after the C (for 25 cents) due to the first one being punched too high. This created what looks like a colon symbol after the C.

My guess is that the person working on the working die somehow got offline when punching these two features in. Once it was discovered, they tried to efface or lap the die at these two points to try and erase them. However they were to deeply struck into the die and the lapping mearly made them appear smaller.

This die was more than likely made in late 1818, then only pressed into service late in 1819. The style of the figure punches used for the 2 and the 5 are the same ones used previously in 1818 and new punches of a different style were used in producing the other two reverse found in 1819. These new punches were more than likely from ones purchased by the mint from Richard Starr and paid for on 2/24/1819.

This reverse die is found on two die marriages in 1819, B-3 & B-4.

The B-4 was struck before B-3 as a crack develops on this reverse from the rim up through the left side of the 5 and eventually into the stem below the eagle during the striking of the B-3 die marriage.

The Obverse of the B-4 ended in catstrophic failure developing a retained cud through the date forcing the retirement of that die and creating a somewhat scarce die marriage. Once the reverse was paired with a new obverse there were many coins struck as the B-3 die marrige is the most common one found for 1819.

QN

doh

Wow, thanks for the info. Kind of a neat little "mistake" I think.

MillerJW

WOW Really Cool !!!!