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Hentsch & Berton's Assay Office Memorandum 1865 [158073]

Currency:USD Category:Coins & Paper Money / Ingots Start Price:1,500.00 USD Estimated At:3,000.00 - 5,000.00 USD
Hentsch & Berton's Assay Office Memorandum  1865  [158073]

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Very rare; possibly unique. Ex. John J. Ford Jr. Collection. Memorandum of Gold Bullion deposited at Hentsch & Berton's Assay Office. Dateline San Francisco, September 14th, 1865 by bankers Sime & Co. On deposit, 53.38 ounces, made into a 53.34 ounce bar, .864 fineness. 6.5 x 10.5" Red print on creme paper. Folds, soiling, small tears, tape repair on reverse. Hentsch & Berton were the successors in 1863 to Henry Hentsch's banking and assay business in San Francisco. Hentsch was born in Geneva in approximately 1830 and arrived in California in 1849. After working in Grass Valley and Sonoma he opened an assay office and bank in San Francisco around 1856. Hentsch is perhaps best known to numismatists by the rare Hentsch gold ingots found at the wreck site of the S.S. Central America, which sank in 1857. Ephemera from Hentsch is even rarer than the ingots. San Francisco California Franklin Collection