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Where can I get info on 1861-O Half Dollar Varieties?
Halfhunter06
Posts: 1,345 ✭✭✭
I am trying to determine if my 1861-O Half was struck under the US government or the State of Louisiana. I already know its not one of the 3 CSA types. Where can i locate the info for these varieties? I know TPG services have identified these coins.
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I don't know of any other in depth analize available online.
You might ask on the discussion board of Gerry Fortin's seateddimevarieties website; someone there should have a copy and may be willing to share.
Also, Bill Bugert is doing a set of books on varieties of the Seated Halves; I don't know if he's published the one on New Orleans yet, though.
edited to add: The detailed info isn't in the W-B book, as it wasn't known until a fairly long time after the book was published.
Check out the Southern Gold Society
<< <i>I am trying to determine if my 1861-O Half was struck under the US government or the State of Louisiana. I already know its not one of the 3 CSA types. Where can i locate the info for these varieties? I know TPG services have identified these coins. >>
My understanding is there is no way to know.
I had a hoard of over 200 of these and Randy was able to trace the marriages. He divided them and I am pretty sure can tell you which government issued a specific coin.
The Republic hoard had a number of these and he was mostly able to tell, even if they were not in good shape after being in the water.
Look for the article that he wrote about these.
I firmly believe in numismatics as the world's greatest hobby, but recognize that this is a luxury and without collectors, we can all spend/melt our collections/inventories.
eBaystore
1861-O varieties
In 2005, Randy Wiley published an article in The Gobrecht Journal (#94) that detailed the 14 known die marriages (and the CSA Reverse Variety) of 1861-O Seated Half Dollars. He stated that his research suggests that Die Marriages 1 - 3 were struck while the Mint was under US Government control, Die Marriages 4 - 8 were struck while the Mint was under the control of the State of Louisiana and Die Marriages 9 - 15 were struck while the Mint was under the control of the Confederacy. (He suggests that the attribution of which Die Marriages were struck under which government may be subject to correction upon further analysis.)
As you know from consulting the book linked by rhedden, in 1993, W-B only detailed four die marriages: one generic listing and three listings associated with the Confederacy. (Wiley noted that he and Bugert had identified a total of over 1,000 die marriages, but space limitations only let them describe 306 in the book.)
In the 2005 article, Wiley acknowledges that in March 1992, Julian lent him a box of 189 circulated 1861-O halves. He compared these coins to the 33 coins belonging to him and Bill Bugert. He also mentions that in January 2005 he studied a hoard of coins that had been salvaged from the SS Republic, but doesn't indicate how many coins were in that hoard.
Check out the Southern Gold Society