5765

1850 $5 Dubosq & Co. Five Dollar Obverse and Reverse D

Currency:USD Category:Coins & Paper Money / US Coins Start Price:1,700.00 USD Estimated At:1.00 - 1,000,000.00 USD
1850 $5 Dubosq & Co. Five Dollar Obverse and Reverse D
<B>1850<$5> Dubosq & Co. Five Dollar Obverse and Reverse Die Trials MS63 PCGS.</B></I> K-3 and K-3a, R.8. For most collectors of territorial coinage, this pair of splashers is about as close as they will get to the actual coins of Theodore Dubosq. Like other private minters in Gold Rush California, Dubosq's coins were assayed by Augustus Humbert and found to have $4.96 in gold. This result was published in the <I>Alta California,</B></I> and Dubosq protested that the silver contained in the coins brought their intrinsic value to more than face value. While this was true, Humbert lacked sufficient parting acids to perform such a test--his response was the cost of extracting the silver alloy was worth more than the silver recovered. The results were predictable with the Dubosq firm suffering a loss of public confidence. Many of their coins were returned and melted, and very few remain today.<BR> One note worthy of mention is that the engraver of the 1850 dies may have been James Longacre. Patterns were found in his estate (these pieces perhaps?) and close inspection shows a remarkable similarity between the devices on these splashers and federal half eagles of the period.<BR> Struck in white metal, these pieces retain almost complete brightness of the white metal composition. The thin metal on which they were struck show the waviness seen on splashers, and the obverse pressing seems to have remnants of paper on the back. Of the greatest importance to collectors of territorial gold and significant rarities in their right, splashers such as these give the numismatist a rare insight into the production of these historic coins.