1852 Moffatt & Company gold pieces look like US gold.
RogerB
Posts: 8,852 ✭✭✭✭✭
Someone will eventually find the rest of this story.
Treasury Department
May 4, 1852
George N. Eckert, Esq.
Director of the Mint
Philadelphia
Sir:
I acknowledge receipt of your letter of the 1st inst. on the subject of the resemblance of the coin issued by Moffatt & Co. of California to the regular coin of the United States, and state in reply that the Department will by the next steamer, address the United States assayer at San Francisco on the subject
Very Respectfully, Your Obt. Servt.
/s/ Thomas Corwin,
Secretary of the Treasury
RG104 Entry1, Box May 1852
3
Comments
WOW... what a way to do business.
Cool!
But everybody knows that changing one tiny thing in the design, even if it be the addition of a tiny "iota" mark inside the craw, protects the maker from charges of counterfeiting!!!!!
..or wacking it onto a scrapped-off coin....
@RogerB ....Do you expect to find a follow up communication? Or is it likely lost to history... Cheers, RickO
Great question!
BHNC #203
That's really neat. It could be they just dropped the subject as U.S. gold coinage production ramped up in the 1850s, and the production of territorial pieces correspondingly dwindled.
People really knew good penmanship back then. My Mom had great handwriting. I don't.
Lafayette Grading Set
I hope to eventually find additional correspondence on the subject. But the Mint archives have no useful index, finding aid or anything that will tell where to look. Must of the material was collected during the Greater Depression (1930s not 2000s) and workers put documents in boxes and gave them names....no real organization.
Here is a bit of the 5-page letter from Dir Eckert that prompted Corwin's reply at the top of this thread.
Good luck in your research!
BHNC #203
If I had to guess, the original letter must have referred to the 1849-50 dated Moffat pieces, as the 1852-dated $10s couldn't have been mistaken by anyone for a US or even an Assay Office piece. The earlier Moffat $5s and $10s continued to circulate past 1851 and the James King of William debacle, as evidenced by the number of Moffat pieces found on the Central America.
What is now proved was once only imagined. - William Blake
wow what penmanship too!
Coin's for sale/trade.
Tom Pilitowski
US Rare Coin Investments
800-624-1870