Confederate minted 1861-O Seated Half Dollar, speared olive bud: My first decent coin purchase

justbored

I mainly collect Virginia and North Carolina obsolete currency. For a while I've been wanting one of the 1861-O Seated Half's with one of the die's that shows that it was minted during the time the Confederates controlled the New Orleans mint. I finally pulled the trigger. Although I have no need to buy graded currency, and I know the TPG's make mistakes, I wanted to get a slabbed one as I feel a lot better about that when dealing with something out of my comfort zone. This one is a NGC VF 30. It has the telltale speared olive bud reverse die, WB#104. Although you could not see it in the seller's photos I'm also pretty positive that it has the die crack bisested obverse die, #WB103, which was a nice bonus. This is my first decent coin purchase, very happy with it! Here's the seller's pictures, which are better than anything I could take.

Pictures used with permission.

rhedden

I never understood the premiums attached to the "Confederate" 1861-O die marriages. The rest of the mintage of this date was struck by the same folks at the same facility, right? Correct me if I misunderstood, but it's just that the CSA took over the southern government during the production run of halves in 1861. My Confederate neighbor here in Texas, who flies the Reb flag on his lawn every Flag Day, and won't even look this particular Yank in the eye as I drive by his fort on the way to work in the morning, might collect these by die variety.

Nice coin, BTW. I completely lack this date in my set for some reason.

justbored

"his fort"haha

This issue was minted under three different authorities of the New Orleans Mint. The mintage numbers appear to be

U.S. 330,000
State of Louisiana 1,240,000
Confederate Govn 963,633

I would imagine that the number that are nowadays in a condition to be attributable to a particular minting body would be a lot lower.

DaveG

If you're interested, Randy Wiley did an attribution guide for the 1861-O halves in an article in The Gobrecht Journal in 2005 (Issue #94).

I think you can get re-prints from the LSCC - check with Coinosaurus.

Timbuk3

Sweet, congratulations !!!

ricko

Nice piece..congratulations on finding what you wanted...Cheers, RickO

LindeDad

Anybody else see that green? I would think very seriously about getting that coin Professionally conserved as it is a absolute rarity.
Added the Professionally

BillJones

It amazes me that the third party graders don't something about PVC before they slab a coin. I guess it has to with the price paid, but still putting the coin in a holder with PVC on the coin is not a good long term strategy for the neither the owner nor the grading company.

johnny9434

congrats on a good pick up

Musky1011

I like it.. I have been unfortunate to be born in 1961. My centennial set 1861 set has some very expensive coins..