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1860 $5 Mormon Five Dollar MS62 NGC. Kagin-6, High R.5 1860[$5] Mormon Five Dollar MS62 NGC.

Currency:USD Category:Coins & Paper Money / US Coins Start Price:950.00 USD Estimated At:1.00 - 1,000,000.00 USD
1860 $5 Mormon Five Dollar MS62 NGC. Kagin-6, High R.5 1860[$5] Mormon Five Dollar MS62 NGC.
<B>1860<$5> Mormon Five Dollar MS62 NGC.</B></I> Kagin-6, High R.5. The history of the Mormons and their relation to territorial gold is interesting and full of curious byways. After the Mexican War, the Mormon Battalion returned to Yerba Buena (later known as San Francisco). The men were ordered by Brigham Young to remain in California during the winter of 1848 and earn as much money as possible before traveling to Utah. One of the members of the battalion, James Marshall, went to work building a sawmill for John Sutter on the American River. It was Marshall who first discovered gold there on January 24, 1848. Other members of the battalion picked up nuggets before returning to Deseret (Utah). This, of course, put the Mormons in the same predicament as the settlers in northern California. How to value gold dust and nuggets? Their resourcefulness resulted in the first Mormon coinage in 1849.<BR> It is not known whether the Mormon hierarchy intentionally deceived those who accepted their coinage dated 1849 and 1850. In their defense, they may not have known that these early coins were 20% undervalued. There was no one in Deseret who was an assayer. Also, the coins were struck from unrefined gold ore from California. Such gold had an average fineness of .890, rather than the accepted coin fineness of .900. Eckfeldt and DuBois also found them to be underweight. Newspapers of the day labeled the coins as "spurious" and "debased," even "vile falsehoods." The half eagles of 1860 were struck from gold from Colorado, which had an average fineness of .917, and these pieces were of full weight and fineness.<BR> All Mormon gold was struck for local usage. The use of gold dust and nuggets was inconvenient for commercial trade, and even though Mormons were responsible for early discoveries of gold on the American River, as a group Mormons were more interested in the commercial aspec