A Rare 1874-S Seated Half Dollar with a History and a Story

Southcounty · April 16, 2026 2:55PM

Nearly one year ago I was browsing the auction offerings of a now retired coin dealer and stopped to take an extended look at an 1874-S seated half dollar graded MS64 with a CAC sticker. The auction listing identified it as die marriage WB-2, which would represent the marriage of Obverse 2 with the distinctive Reverse B, as described in Bill Bugert’s comprehensive first volume book covering San Francisco seated half dollars. However, a closer inspection revealed that this was actually a marriage between Obverse 1 and Reverse B. This die marriage was not originally listed in Bill’s first book however this new die marriage was described as WB-5 in a supplemental addendum sheet also compiled by Bill Bugert and published online as shown at this link:

http://old.lsccweb.org/BillBugertBooks/1874-S-WB5.pdf

This new die marriage had been described by a Stack’s Bowers auction cataloger in their March 2015 Baltimore Sale, and presumably shared with Bill Bugert by Dick Osburn. The pictures on the addenda sheet caught my eye and after careful comparison I was able to determine that this new offering in May of 2025 and listed as a WB-2 was actually the discovery coin and plate coin as shown for the new WB-5 die marriage from the 2015 sale. It now appeared in a different holder with a different certification number, despite having been previously auctioned unattributed by Legend in its current holder in February of 2023.

In all fairness I did email the company auctioning the coin to alert them to this attribution error, but the listing remained unaltered. After reaching out to one fellow collector to judge their interest I decided to bid on the lot myself and eventually won it. Since that time, I have traced this same coin back through four different holders with different certification numbers all the way back to the Boys Town Sale in March of 1998.

With help from the forum member previously known as @Barberian who had a great love for rare seated half dollar die marriages, including the 1874-S, we were able to compile a list of known examples. Bill Bugert had assigned a rarity rating of R-7 and we would agree with that rating as we were only able to identify six examples after much research and searching. The known census is as follows:

1.-CACG MS66, the NGC Plate Coin and currently listed for sale unattributed with DLRC
2.-PCGS MS64 the discovery coin and Plate Coin as described in this post
3.-Raw UNC that has been cleaned and previously listed on eBay unattributed
4.-PCGS VF20 a previously raw coin purchased from Brian Greer by Barberian unattributed
5.-Raw fair example found on eBay
6.-Raw fair details example also owned by Barberian

After reviewing hundreds and hundreds of 1874-S seated half dollar sales I would first conclude that the population reports are likely way off base with many duplicate submissions, especially for the high end examples. Second, I would assert that the WB-5 is a true R7 coin behind only the 1874-S WB-4 currently listed as an R-8, but would also include the WB-2 as a very difficult die marriage, especially in high grade. The WB-1 and WB-3 are much more available and typical of most 1874-S examples.

This pursuit of information on 1874-S halves would not have been as complete without the assistance of former board member Barberian, who unfortunately was banned in part due to his great passion for this particular die marriage and being frustrated in the pursuit of proper attribution for his VF20 example as a WB-5 and not a WB-2.