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894

NV - c1860s - Berry Silver Ingot

Currency:USD Category:Coins & Paper Money / Bullion Start Price:11,500.00 USD Estimated At:23,000.00 - 30,000.00 USD
NV - c1860s - Berry Silver Ingot
Session D is a Mail-Bid Only Auction. Absentee bids will be accepted only. No live bidding will be allowed. All winners will be contacted after the auction. BIDDING ENDS MONDAY JUNE 27 AT 5PM PACIFIC TIME!!!




Research of this unique W. L. Berry ingot is difficult. He was not found in any of the standard references, which includes the 1867 Bean Directory of Nevada County and 1871 Mckenney Directories of Nevada County, California, the 1876 McKenney’s California Business Directory that covered Nevada County; or any of the Pacific Coast Business Directories (1867, 1871, 1875); the US Census data; the 1862, 1863 Kelley Directories of Nevada Territory, or subsequent Nevada business directories. The ingot was written up by us previously as Nevada City, California, but after much thought, I cannot rule out any Nevada state mining camp. The style of the ingot is 1860’s, possibly into the early 1870’s. The Nevada City guess was appropriate, as the name “Nevada” is very often used from that period from Nevada City. But further research opened up too many doors into both Nevada City and into Nevada mining camps as a whole.

W. L. Berry was born in New York to Reuben and Amanda Berry in 1845. They emigrated to California during the gold rush, landing in Salmon Falls, El Dorado County in 1860. It was “one of the earliest successful gold camps” according to Gudde, and may have been started by Mormons in 1848, It is now possibly covered by Folsom Lake. That year (1860), F. W. Blake was in Grass Valley in an assay business, moving to Carson in 1861, then to Unionville in 1862, and on to Golconda and later Silver City, Idaho in 1866.



In April, 1876, Berry opened an assay office for Blake in Tucson, AZ (Arizona Weekly Miner (4/28/1876). By 1880, he was gone from Arizona to parts unknown. For the rest of his life after 1860, W.L. Berry avoided the Federal Census, not unusual for a mining man that traveled from mining camp to mining camp. By 1880, the need for local assay offices was diminishing, and Berry likely would have taken a job with a producing mining company. He would thus not show up in a business directory with his own business, and if he was working in a remote mining camp, he was likely out of touch with census takers.

If Berry was a student of Blake, as it appears obvious, the question is then where was he working between 1860 and 1876. It might be opined that a young Berry met up with Blake in Carson City or Unionville, though the possibility does exist that the coincidence of Blake in the Grass Valley area in 1860 and Berry nearby in the American River area near Auburn is what led to their meeting. These two areas are very close together, and a happenstance meeting was easily possible, since Grass Valley-Nevada City were the two most populous towns in 1860, and these towns would have been a supply center for Salmon Falls.



Did Berry open an assay office in Nevada City in the early 1860’s? only further newspaper research will perhaps show this, though few assayers advertised their work, especially Berry’s friend Blake. The strong possibility exists that Berry was also playing with the word “Nevada” in one of the remote Nevada mining camps, such as those where Blake worked.

Regardless, the association of Berry and Blake is important, and may ultimately involve Pletz, another associate of Blake in Arizona. By the way, we were recently shown a wonderful silver ingot of Pletz, previously unknown to us, that was made in the exact same style as those of Blake in Silver City, Idaho.

More research is warranted on this important ingot, and will undoubtedly help unwrap the secrets of some of these lesser known western assayers.



This trapezoidal shaped gold and silver ingot measures approximately 2 x .75 x .5” and weighs 206.5 grams. The face reads: SILVER 854 F[INE]/GOLD 15FIN[E]. The back reads: W.L. BERRY, ASSAYER/NEVADA. The top side reads: GOLD $1.46. The bottom side reads: SILVER $7.34. The left side reads: OZ/6.65 and the right side reads: No.3. Both faces of this ingot are polished.

This ingot is from the John J. Ford, Jr. Collection .The Stack’s Catalog labeled this ingot as “The Only Bar by Berry Known to the Cataloguer” and “ex Art Kagin Collection, as well as ex Newcomer’s Collection, according to Mehl’s 1931 inventory”. Very Fine.





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