Heritage World Coin Auctions
FUN Signature US Coin Sale 1251 4-6 & 8-9 Jan 2017
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Territorial Gold
1851 $50 LE Humbert Fifty Dollar, Lettered Edge, 880 Thous. AU58 PCGS Secure. K-2, R.5. Humbert 880 Thous. No 50 on reverse. The Lettered Edge octagonal fifty dollar gold coins are among the most iconic and certainly the most unusual Territorial issues that today remind numismatists of the heady, historic days of the Forty-Niners and the great California Gold Rush, one of the most seismic shifts in the great fabric of American society.
Starting with the discovery of a few flakes of the yellow metal found by John Marshall in the millrace of John Sutter's under-construction sawmill on the American River in January 1848, the Gold Rush would forever alter American history.
Two waves of private coiners would come and go in the early Gold Rush years of 1849 and 1850, alternately victims of greed, incompetence, yellow journalism, and bad publicity or a combination thereof. Of the early private gold coiners in California, only Moffat & Co. would last from 1849 to 1850, much less into 1851.
In 1850 Augustus Humbert was named United States Assayer and contracted with Moffat & Co. to assay and fix the value of gold on ingots and coins marked with the stamp of the United States. It was logical that Moffat & Co. would be the firm of choice for such functions. The Moffat & Co. coinage was of good value and always passed at par, never doubted or discounted.
After the Moffat firm began striking the 1851- and 1852-dated fifty dollar gold coins (and later issues) with Humbert's identification and that of the United States Assay Office, the coins had a competitive advantage that simply could not be matched among the early private gold assayers-coiners. Moffat & Co. and its successor firms were, in effect, a semiofficial branch mint of the United States
This example is graded AU58 by PCGS and certified in a Secure holder. It features bright yellow-gold surfaces with a greenish glint of California gold that show excellent preservation and superb eye appeal. The obverse is particularly sharply struck and free of mentionable marks or rim bumps. A few small marks appear on the reverse, and a rim nick or two (possibly areas where test cuts were made), but this is an exceptional coin throughout, one that is clearly toward the high end of the surviving population. Listed on page 391 of the 2017 Guide Book. Population: 8 in 58, 10 finer (11/16).
1851 $50 LE Humbert Fifty Dollar, Lettered Edge, 880 Thous. AU58 PCGS Secure. K-2, R.5. Humbert 880 Thous. No 50 on reverse. The Lettered Edge octagonal fifty dollar gold coins are among the most iconic and certainly the most unusual Territorial issues that today remind numismatists of the heady, historic days of the Forty-Niners and the great California Gold Rush, one of the most seismic shifts in the great fabric of American society.
Starting with the discovery of a few flakes of the yellow metal found by John Marshall in the millrace of John Sutter's under-construction sawmill on the American River in January 1848, the Gold Rush would forever alter American history.
Two waves of private coiners would come and go in the early Gold Rush years of 1849 and 1850, alternately victims of greed, incompetence, yellow journalism, and bad publicity or a combination thereof. Of the early private gold coiners in California, only Moffat & Co. would last from 1849 to 1850, much less into 1851.
In 1850 Augustus Humbert was named United States Assayer and contracted with Moffat & Co. to assay and fix the value of gold on ingots and coins marked with the stamp of the United States. It was logical that Moffat & Co. would be the firm of choice for such functions. The Moffat & Co. coinage was of good value and always passed at par, never doubted or discounted.
After the Moffat firm began striking the 1851- and 1852-dated fifty dollar gold coins (and later issues) with Humbert's identification and that of the United States Assay Office, the coins had a competitive advantage that simply could not be matched among the early private gold assayers-coiners. Moffat & Co. and its successor firms were, in effect, a semiofficial branch mint of the United States
This example is graded AU58 by PCGS and certified in a Secure holder. It features bright yellow-gold surfaces with a greenish glint of California gold that show excellent preservation and superb eye appeal. The obverse is particularly sharply struck and free of mentionable marks or rim bumps. A few small marks appear on the reverse, and a rim nick or two (possibly areas where test cuts were made), but this is an exceptional coin throughout, one that is clearly toward the high end of the surviving population. Listed on page 391 of the 2017 Guide Book. Population: 8 in 58, 10 finer (11/16).