THE LIBERTY SEATED CENT

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V20 2017 INDEX E-SYLUM ARCHIVE

The E-Sylum: Volume 20, Number 18, April 30, 2017, Article 21

Len Augsburger published this article in today's May 2017 issue of the The E-Gobrecht, the electronic newsletter of the Liberty Seated Collectors Club. With permission, we're republishing it here. -Editor

One of the most useful archival resources in the Newman Numismatic Portal are the general correspondence files of the U.S. Mint. R. W. Julian directed the scanning of this series (National Archives record group 104, entry 1), under a grant from the Central States Numismatic Society, and shared the scans (covering the period 1792-1857) with the Newman Portal.

Among the tens of thousands of pages in this series is a single sheet containing a letter from Mint Director James Ross Snowden to James Guthrie, Secretary of the Treasury, dated March 18, 1854, and transcribed as follows:

I herewith enclose to you a few specimens (9) of the proposed one-cent coin. These pieces are prepared solely to exhibit the size and character of the metal. They are intrinsically worth say 80 cents per 100, @ consequent seignorage of 20 pr. cent.

The dies were hastily prepared; the head being cut by copying lathe, from a silver-dollar pattern with[out] any re-touching or alteration. Both the metal and the devices will be better upon the coin if authorized. Mr. Booth [Melter & Refiner] says, “this metal will not alter in the wear.” If desirable more specimens will be forwarded to you when they shall have been prepared.

The coins enclosed were examples of the Judd-156 to Judd-159 “Liberty Seated” pattern cents, and the obverse of this pattern nicely demonstrates a step in the process of mid-19th century die replication. A reducing lathe traced over a model coin in a circular fashion and imparted the same design onto a working die. The circular lines were normally polished out of the working die, but in this particular case the Mint Director decided to proceed without polishing the obverse die and moved directly to striking examples.

The model coin is thought to be an 1854 seated dollar (the crosslet of the 4 is not completely evident) although the Mint Director here makes reference to a “pattern” - but no dollar patterns are known for 1854. The date styles of 1851 and 1854 seated dollars show that the model coin was indeed an 1854 dollar, as the date for 1851 is high and slopes downward, while the 1854 date is more centered in the field between base and rim.

The Secretary of the Treasury must have answered in the affirmative, for on March 21 the Mint Director wrote to James Booth and requested a hundred “perfect examples” of the cent, “accompanied by a report to be submitted to Congress.” As far as we know, these “perfect examples” were never struck, a pity for modern researchers as comparisons of the known specimens with “perfect examples” would be most instructive. All that remains today are the “hastily prepared” examples, along with a few bits of illuminating documentation.

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