Does anyone have more information (or pictures) of Gilbert Stuart’s re-designs of early US coinage?
Longacre
Posts: 16,717 ✭✭✭
I was taking a look at the Breen Encyclopedia of Half Cents. There are lots of tidbits in there that I never knew. For example, I never knew that Gilbert Stuart (the famous portrait artist) came up with re-design proposals of early US coinage. Here is some more information, which I quote from Breen:
“This design [the Draped Bust half cents] originally represented the fulfillment of an ambitious dream for Henry William DeSaussure, who was David Rittenhouse’s successor in the Mint Directorship. On his accession, DeSaussure declared that he would place gold coinage into circulation, and that he would improve the designs of all coin denominations, particularly the silver coins. To implement this slap at Robert Scot’s efforts, DeSaussure (following a letter of recommendation from Edmund Randolph) commissioned the illustrious portrait artist, Gilbert Stuart, to furnish a drawing of Ms. Liberty suitable for coin designs in different denominations; the intention seems to have been to use a single design for all of the gold denominations, and another for all of the silver.
Stuart completed his drawing in Newport, RI, sometime in either August or September, 1795; it portrayed a Philadelphia socialite, Mrs. William Bingham (nee Ann Willing), who was said to be one of the loveliest ladies of her time. John Eckstein was hired to translate this drawing into models. On September 9, he was paid $30 for his efforts, which was a dreadful mistake, as his models lost whatever subtlety the original drawing might have had. Stuart’s family kept the story secret for many years. It was mentioned by Snowden in 1860, and again in greater detail in an 1887 issue of The American Journal of Numismatics. The original drawing has long since vanished.”
[Footnote related to this text: “… Stuart facetiously remarked that “Liberty on the other coins had run mad”—referring to the disheveled hair on the head of Liberty on the previous coins [the type of 1795-1797]. “We will bind it up, and thus render her a steady matron.””]
***********
Questions:
(1) Was it customary for the Mint Director (DeSaussure) to be the one to decide that coinage designs needed to be changed and actually take steps to implement changes? At what point did Congress take control of design changes, or was the early coinage in such flux that there was no argument by Congress that the Mint Director could do as he pleased?
(2) Does anyone have more background on why Mrs. William Bingham was chosen for the sketches? Was she truly a handsome woman, or was there another reason?
(3) I don’t know much about John Eckstein, but I assume he was an independent engraver (outside of the Mint). I understand that DeSaussure wanted to avoid Scot, but were there other engravers around that might have done a better job? Why was Eckstein chosen?
(4) Why was the “story” kept secret for many years? Was the “secret” kept because Stuart was asked to redesign the coinage, or was it because the models were so terrible?
(5) Have the drawings by Stuart been found, or are they still lost? Does anyone know?
“This design [the Draped Bust half cents] originally represented the fulfillment of an ambitious dream for Henry William DeSaussure, who was David Rittenhouse’s successor in the Mint Directorship. On his accession, DeSaussure declared that he would place gold coinage into circulation, and that he would improve the designs of all coin denominations, particularly the silver coins. To implement this slap at Robert Scot’s efforts, DeSaussure (following a letter of recommendation from Edmund Randolph) commissioned the illustrious portrait artist, Gilbert Stuart, to furnish a drawing of Ms. Liberty suitable for coin designs in different denominations; the intention seems to have been to use a single design for all of the gold denominations, and another for all of the silver.
Stuart completed his drawing in Newport, RI, sometime in either August or September, 1795; it portrayed a Philadelphia socialite, Mrs. William Bingham (nee Ann Willing), who was said to be one of the loveliest ladies of her time. John Eckstein was hired to translate this drawing into models. On September 9, he was paid $30 for his efforts, which was a dreadful mistake, as his models lost whatever subtlety the original drawing might have had. Stuart’s family kept the story secret for many years. It was mentioned by Snowden in 1860, and again in greater detail in an 1887 issue of The American Journal of Numismatics. The original drawing has long since vanished.”
[Footnote related to this text: “… Stuart facetiously remarked that “Liberty on the other coins had run mad”—referring to the disheveled hair on the head of Liberty on the previous coins [the type of 1795-1797]. “We will bind it up, and thus render her a steady matron.””]
***********
Questions:
(1) Was it customary for the Mint Director (DeSaussure) to be the one to decide that coinage designs needed to be changed and actually take steps to implement changes? At what point did Congress take control of design changes, or was the early coinage in such flux that there was no argument by Congress that the Mint Director could do as he pleased?
(2) Does anyone have more background on why Mrs. William Bingham was chosen for the sketches? Was she truly a handsome woman, or was there another reason?
(3) I don’t know much about John Eckstein, but I assume he was an independent engraver (outside of the Mint). I understand that DeSaussure wanted to avoid Scot, but were there other engravers around that might have done a better job? Why was Eckstein chosen?
(4) Why was the “story” kept secret for many years? Was the “secret” kept because Stuart was asked to redesign the coinage, or was it because the models were so terrible?
(5) Have the drawings by Stuart been found, or are they still lost? Does anyone know?
Always took candy from strangers
Didn't wanna get me no trade
Never want to be like papa
Working for the boss every night and day
--"Happy", by the Rolling Stones (1972)
Didn't wanna get me no trade
Never want to be like papa
Working for the boss every night and day
--"Happy", by the Rolling Stones (1972)
0
Comments
Gilbert Stuart's portrait of the Ann Bingham.
<< <i>
Gilbert Stuart's portrait of the Ann Bingham. >>
Is this portrait the same as the drawing for the coins?
PS. She is quite a handsome woman.
Didn't wanna get me no trade
Never want to be like papa
Working for the boss every night and day
--"Happy", by the Rolling Stones (1972)
Good question though, and it should be a fun one to look into.
<< <i>The Ann Bingham story is hogwash. >>
The entire story, including the hiring of Stuart?
Didn't wanna get me no trade
Never want to be like papa
Working for the boss every night and day
--"Happy", by the Rolling Stones (1972)
Link to Draped Bust home page
Liberty: Parent of Science & Industry
<< <i>Link to 3 portraits of Anne
Link to Draped Bust home page >>
Here's some information from the website, in case anyone is interested:
Willing Bingham:
The Evidence
Though the majority of numismatic writers who write about the subject indicate that it was Anne Willing Bingham who posed as a model for Liberty on early American Draped Bust coins, another opinion is that this is just a myth. Supporting this opinion is the lack of direct evidence, such as contemporary documentation, connecting Anne Bingham with the Draped Bust coins.
The fact is, though, that much written material from that period hasn't survived.
What's more, the argument can be made that information linking Anne Bingham and the Draped Bust Liberty may have been deliberately suppressed at the time. To show a recognizable person, the wife and daughter of powerful politicians, on the nation's coins would have been politically dangerous. The Mint was under attack in its early days from opponents of President George Washington's administration, who charged that the Mint was too expensive and had failed to provide a circulating medium. Washington was a Federalist, and Anne Bingham's husband and father were also powerful figures among Federalist leaders. A recognizable portrait of a Federalist would have given political ammunition to the Washington administration's political opponents.
Finally, there's a lot of indirect, or circumstantial, evidence linking Anne Bingham with the Draped Bust Liberty:
Anne Bingham was close personal friends with key players, including George Washington, U.S. president at the time; Thomas Jefferson, who was instrumental in establishing the Mint; and Gilbert Stuart, who created the image of Liberty on a sketch that was used by Mint engraver Robert Scot in designing the Draped Bust coins.
Though Stuart's Draped Bust sketch hasn't survived, what has survived from the hand of Gilbert Stuart are other works depicting Anne Bingham, including a sketch, a portrait, an unfinished portrait, and an unfinished portrait of the Bingham family.
There is a distinct resemblance of Liberty on the Draped Bust coins to Anne Bingham in these works of Stuart (you'll find copies of some of Stuart's works later in this Web site). The resemblance isn't exact--the image of Liberty on the Draped Bust coins was in all likelihood idealized as it was created--but it's close enough not to rule out the connection.
Anne Bingham lived in Philadelphia, site of the U.S. Mint.
Her father and husband were co-founders of the Bank of North America, also in Philadelphia.
She was regarded as the most beautiful woman of her time in Europe as well as America--engravings of her were sold in fashionable shops in Paris and London.
The Anne Bingham/Draped Bust connection is mentioned in Walter Breen's 1988 Complete Encyclopedia of U.S. and Colonial Coins, among other recent works. Breen references page 177 of the 1861 book A Description of the Medals of Washington, of National and Miscellaneous Medals, and of Other Objects of Interest in the Museum of the Mint by former U.S. Mint director James Snowden. However, Snowden makes no such connection himself. All he does is indicate that it was Gilbert Stuart who created the Draped Bust image, according to a member of the Stuart family. No mention is made of the model Stuart used.
The Anne Bingham/Draped Bust connection is also mentioned in the annual Coin World Almanac, beginning in 1976, though a question mark is placed after Bingham's name to indicate uncertainty. This Coin World Almanac reference in turn was based on speculation in Don Taxay's 1966 book The U.S. Mint and Coinage. Taxay based his linking Bingham with the Draped Bust Liberty on the similarity of one of Stuart's paintings of her to that of the Liberty image. In his 1976 Silver Dollar Encyclopedia, Jim Osbon indicates that Anne Willing Bingham was the model for the Draped Bust coinage. No mention of the model used was made in John W. Highfill's 1992 The Comprehensive U.S. Silver Dollar Encyclopedia. In his 1993 Silver Dollars and Trade Dollars of the United States: A Complete Encyclopedia, Q. David Bowers says that Robert Scot "may well" have had Anne Bingham in mind when designing the Draped Bust Liberty, but this can't be proven with the documentary materials known today, and the discovery of further documentary materials is "highly unlikely."
Nonetheless, I'm trying to track down any earlier references to the Anne Bingham/Draped Bust connection. If you know of any, I'd appreciate it if you could send information about them my way.
Interestingly (interestingly if you're a pedantic stickler), you sometimes see Anne's name spelled "Ann." It's spelled this way, for example, in Taxay's 1966 book, in the Coin World Almanac, in Q. David Bowers' Silver Dollars and Trade Dollars of the United States: A Complete Encyclopedia, in Jim Osbon's Silver Dollar Encyclopedia, and in some coin magazine articles. The spelling "Anne" was used in a 1988 doctoral dissertation about her life (Making the Private Public: Anne Willing Bingham's Role as a Leader of Philadelphia's Social Elite in the Late Eighteenth Century), in a 1969 book about the life of her husband (The Golden Voyage: The Life and Times of William Bingham), and in a 1995 encyclopedia (Her Heritage: A Biographical Encyclopedia of Famous American Women). The spelling "Anne" was also used by Thomas Jefferson in the letters he wrote to her and in a letter her husband wrote about her as she was dying. And it's "Anne" on her tombstone. However, Amy Henderson, who as I'm writing this is working on a dissertation about Anne Willing Bingham, says that she has seen it spelled both "Anne" and "Ann" in eighteenth century documents, though most historians today spell it "Anne." Because people during the eighteenth century were more flexible with spelling than we are today, it's likely that at the time both spellings were considered acceptable.
Finally, sometimes you see Anne Willing Bingham incorrectly referred to as an adult as Anne Willing, though that was her maiden name, which she last used at age 16.
Didn't wanna get me no trade
Never want to be like papa
Working for the boss every night and day
--"Happy", by the Rolling Stones (1972)
<< <i>(1) Was it customary for the Mint Director (DeSaussure) to be the one to decide that coinage designs needed to be changed and actually take steps to implement changes? At what point did Congress take control of design changes, or was the early coinage in such flux that there was no argument by Congress that the Mint Director could do as he pleased? >>
Back then the designs were normally chosen by the Mint Director and the Secretary of the Treasury. When did Congress take control of coin design? Would you believe about 1969. Before then they may have passed laws that specified general things, ie: required mottos, coins larger than ten cents having to have an eagle, a representation of Liberty etc. But the actual designs chosen were decided by the Treasury Secretary. With the Ike dollar though they began specifying the designs, most specificly the reverse being an adaptation of the mission patch design of the Apollo 11 mission.
I was taking a look at the Breen Encyclopedia of Half Cents. There are lots of tidbits in there that I never knew. For example, I never knew that Gilbert Stuart (the famous portrait artist) came up with re-design proposals of early US coinage. Here is some more information, which I quote from Breen:
“This design [the Draped Bust half cents] originally represented the fulfillment of an ambitious dream for Henry William DeSaussure, who was David Rittenhouse’s successor in the Mint Directorship. On his accession, DeSaussure declared that he would place gold coinage into circulation, and that he would improve the designs of all coin denominations, particularly the silver coins. To implement this slap at Robert Scot’s efforts, DeSaussure (following a letter of recommendation from Edmund Randolph) commissioned the illustrious portrait artist, Gilbert Stuart, to furnish a drawing of Ms. Liberty suitable for coin designs in different denominations; the intention seems to have been to use a single design for all of the gold denominations, and another for all of the silver.
Stuart completed his drawing in Newport, RI, sometime in either August or September, 1795; it portrayed a Philadelphia socialite, Mrs. William Bingham (nee Ann Willing), who was said to be one of the loveliest ladies of her time. John Eckstein was hired to translate this drawing into models. On September 9, he was paid $30 for his efforts, which was a dreadful mistake, as his models lost whatever subtlety the original drawing might have had. Stuart’s family kept the story secret for many years. It was mentioned by Snowden in 1860, and again in greater detail in an 1887 issue of The American Journal of Numismatics. The original drawing has long since vanished.”
[Footnote related to this text: “… Stuart facetiously remarked that “Liberty on the other coins had run mad”—referring to the disheveled hair on the head of Liberty on the previous coins [the type of 1795-1797]. “We will bind it up, and thus render her a steady matron.””]
Questions:
(1) Was it customary for the Mint Director (DeSaussure) to be the one to decide that coinage designs needed to be changed and actually take steps to implement changes? At what point did Congress take control of design changes, or was the early coinage in such flux that there was no argument by Congress that the Mint Director could do as he pleased?
The decision about changing coinage designs may have arisen with Mint Director DeSaussure but it was President Washington
who would have made the final decisions. Congress did not become involved directly until recently.
(2) Does anyone have more background on why Mrs. William Bingham was chosen for the sketches? Was she truly a handsome woman, or was there another reason?
There is no proof whatsoever that Anne Willing Bingham was the model for the Draped Bust head. In fact, it is highly unlikely
that this was the case. She was from a prominent Federalist family and for her portrait to have appeared would have been
used to great effect by Washington’s enemies, of which there were many. Taxay first suggested Mrs. Bingham as a model
but this was pure speculation which has now become “fact.”
(3) I don’t know much about John Eckstein, but I assume he was an independent engraver (outside of the Mint). I understand that DeSaussure wanted to avoid Scot, but were there other engravers around that might have done a better job? Why was Eckstein chosen?
Eckstein was not a die engraver but rather made plaster models and other artwork. The drawings were given to him to create
high-quality plasters to guide Engraver Scot. The use of plasters to guide engravers was fairly common in the 18th and early
19th centuries. A.C. Paquet, the assistant mint engraver until 1864, used these regularly in his medal work well into the 1870s.
(4) Why was the “story” kept secret for many years? Was the “secret” kept because Stuart was asked to redesign the coinage, or was it because the models were so terrible?
The story was not kept secret and early mint records virtually never mention the source of the artwork. A member of the Stuart family
simply mentioned it to Mint Director Snowden in the 1850s as an interesting tidbit about the early mint. Prior to 1850 there was little
interest in the designers of coins. (Alexandre Vattemare, in 1861, published a list of American coins and said that the portrait was of
Martha Washington! He seems to have obtained his information from mint officers in the late 1840s.)
(5) Have the drawings by Stuart been found, or are they still lost? Does anyone know?
The drawings are not known to exist and were probably lost by the early 1800s.
Denga
Didn't wanna get me no trade
Never want to be like papa
Working for the boss every night and day
--"Happy", by the Rolling Stones (1972)
1)
Sept. 23, 1848:
"Accompanying this communication you will receive a number of very handsomely executed medals presented by Mr. Alexandre Vattemare to the Treasury Department for the United States Mint. They are fine examples of the perfection to which that art has been attained in France.
"As a mark of estimation and to aid in carrying out the system of national exchanges of which Mr. Vattemare is the distinguished originator, you are hereby authorized to place at his disposal copies of all the coins of the United States and whatever medals you may have in your power to furnish."
2)
What remains of early US Mint drawings is held largely by the Library Company of Philadelphia with a microfilm copy in the Smithsonian Archives of American Art.
Other drawings by Gilbert Stuart, William Rush, Hermann Faber, Henry Mitchell and others are scattered among Smithsonian archives (mostly buried in the various art museum collections), Philadelphia Academy, Massachusetts Historical Society and NARA College Park. I have never been able to connect more than a few with proposed coin designs or the mint.
Here is one of Faber's obverse sketches from 1876. This helped convince director Linderman that he had to widen his search for new designs and a new engraver for the mint:
<< <i>The Evidence...... >>
No disrepect to you Longacre, but "bah, blah, blah". I've heard it all before and don't buy it.
Denga and I disagree on even the possibility that Stuart was involved.
1. The first mention of a possible connection is by Snowden in 1861 who said that a Stuart family member told him Gilbert desiged the head of Liberty in 1795 and supposedly made the disparaging remarks about the earlier design. This is some 65 YEARS AFTER THE FACT and based on family tale. Furthermore, rather than substantiating the tale the disparaging remarks quoted by Snowden make the story even more unbelivable. What, they had a written statement by Gilbert? Oh no, they just passed it down thru the family remembering it word for word. Sure. This sort of this is one of the real "tells" to a family myth.
2. In 1966 Taxay then sez it looks similar to the famous painting to him. Personally other than the big hooters I don't see a resemblance.
3. So there's no archival evidence. Oh yeah, it's lost. The story teller's favorite excuse. Sorry that doesn't wash with me. Funny how every time I went into the archives I found records, but the tale tellers can't. Lemme see, we have records of Voigt engraviing the first designs, we have records for Wright, we have record for Moritz Furst, we have records for Gobrecht doing models in the late 1820s, we have records for Titian Peale and Sully, but Stuart is magically missing.
Sorry, no sale. This is a myth created over half a century after the fact based on family tale, embellished by Taxay's speculation and perpetuated by folks who like a good story. Show me a record.
- Marcus Tullius Cicero, 106-43 BC
Rittenhouse; Powerfull things , evidense, most evidence stands as circumstantial evidence which people were hung or burned for . But rumours seem to last forever.
- Marcus Tullius Cicero, 106-43 BC