Seeking Info On Error Coin I Used To Own

If it was genuine, it would have been known as a 'mint sport', an invention of a minted coin used as a blank, being fed back into a minting press, fitted with the dies of another coin of smaller diameter.

Highly illegal inside 'shed job'.

Sad story ... Reminiscent of the first "Amos & Andy" show, entitled "The Rare Coin" from back in the 1950's. Andy finds an 1877 nickel in circulation and is offered $250 for it by a local coin dealer. That was a princely sum back then! Kingfish learns of it and tries to cash in. Andy accidentally uses the nickel to place a phone call. They get caught while breaking into the pay phone and hauled into court. The judge, learning of their stupidity, lets them off but threatens to jail their attorney who hastily departs from the courtroom. In the end, Andy manages to outwit Kingfish and cashes in the salvaged nickel.

As to the worth of your lost 15 cent piece, it's anybody's guess. I have a 6 cent piece that poses the same question. These rare, double denomination coins need to be seen by the right buyers, and the prices realized can be great one day and not so great on another, it seems; this, IMHO. All a seller needs for these puppies is to find two buyers who desparately want to own the same error.

Wow. This action would have destroyed both an amazing, brand-new Seated Liberty half dollar obverse die and the apparently unused 1857 FE cent die.

I shake my head.

Deliberatly loaded them, quite possibly. Deliberately clashed them, unlikely. This was the era of the "Midnight minter" who was restriking rarities, patterns, 1804 dollars, and fantasies. They were probably trying to create fantasies made with mismatched dies. Problem was such pieces would have needed hand loading into the press and these presses were not designed to do individual strikes. So they would load the press, start it, it would strike the fantasy, eject it and then the dies would clash before they could get the press stopped again.

None of those missed matched die fantasies are known today, probably because they were not successful. What they were probably hoping for was something like a half dollar sized piece with a half dollar on one side and a FE cent in the center of the other. What they would actually get would be a half dollar sized piece with the FE in the center on one side and only the very center area of the half dollar on the other and the rest blank. (And possibly somewhat cupped around the FE side.) Not real impressive. They probably ran a few tests, clashed a few dies, and scrapped the rejected test pieces. The clashed dies were returned to the storeroom and were later used for regular coinage.

If that was genuine, I'm so sorry for you.