LOT Old Heritage Auctions  /  2008 MAR Phoenix (ANA) Signature Coin Auction #1...  / 

45

1776 $1 Continental Dollar, CURRENCY, Pewter, EG

Currency:USD Category:Coins & Paper Money Start Price:14,000.00 USD Estimated At:1.00 - 1,000,000.00 USD
1776 $1 Continental Dollar, CURRENCY, Pewter, EG
<B>1776 $1 Continental Dollar, CURRENCY, Pewter, EG FECIT MS63 NGC.</B></I> Crosby Pl. VIII, Newman 3-D, Breen-1095, R.3. The NGC holder describes this piece as "silver" but we are quite certain it is actually pewter. <BR> Today we call these coins Continental Dollars, although there is no evidence that they were actually intended to be coins valued at one dollar. The size is essentially the same as the Spanish milled dollar that circulated in Colonial America, and the one dollar label is probably due to its size. In his <I>Complete Encyclopedia, </B></I>Walter Breen writes: <BR> "The traditional name 'dollars' for all these coins has lately come under attack. Its sole rationales were size, the existence of a few silver strikings, and Bishop Watson's guesswork. Whatever the tin pieces might have represented, the copper and brass strikings most likely were pattern pence. On September 2, 1776, the Continental Congress valued its paper dollars at par with the Spanish, equating the British shilling of 12 pence to 2/9 dollar: Solomon, p.40. This works out to 54 pence or 108 halfpence to the dollar. As the copper and brass impressions are much heavier than Tower Mint halfpence, their makers and recipients would have thought of them as pennies; nobody had yet proposed to divide the Spanish dollar of 8 Reales into 100 unites, let alone names such a hypothetical unit a cent."<BR> Bishop Watson was the first to describe the Continental pieces in the fifth edition of <I>Chemical Essays,</B></I> published in London in 1789. Raphael Soloman penned "Foreign Specie Coins in the American Colonies," published by American Numismatic Society in 1976. Breen described the brass and copper examples as "pennies" in his <I>Complete Encyclopedia,</B></I> and called the pewter and silver pieces "dollars." Whatever they are called, the pieces struck are essentially patterns for a coinage that remained unissued. An anticipated loan of silver from France never materialized.<BR> The obverse die is signed EG FECIT, meaning that it was made by someone whose initials were EG. Today, EG is identified as Elisha Gallaudet. An engraver from New Jersey, Gallaudet was born about 1730, and died in 1779 according to some sources, and 1805 according to others. He was noted especially for engraving certain colonial paper issues.<BR> This impressive piece has brilliant light and medium gray color, lighter in the fields and darker on the devices. Both sides have satiny luster, especially in the protected areas. An exceptional quality piece for the connoisseur.<BR><BR><b>Shipping:</b> Coins & Currency (<a target="_blank" href="http://www.heritageauctions.com/common/shipping.php">view shipping information</a>)
Sign In to Bookmark Lot