The 1862-S
Seated Liberty half dollar is an interesting study. Although over 1.3 million were minted, almost half a million more than any previous San Francisco Seated Half, this figure must be discounted by the numbers which were shipped overseas for trade purposes. It is therefore difficult to determine the number of surviving examples through traditional computations.
Furthermore, having circulated widely, it is an extreme rarity in Mint State. Heritage Auctions has offered only ten examples in Mint State since 1993, and only one since 2006.
In the late 1950's, a large cache of Liberty
Seated halves was discovered in Guatemala (the Guatemala Hoard). Breen reports:
Quote:
The Guatemala Hoard coins are readily recognizable: They are dated between 1859 and 1865 Philadelphia, and between 1860 and 1865 S, most often between 1861-1862 from either mint, ranging in grade from VF to nearly mint state, all cleaned with baking soda or some abrasive. There were many hundreds of each date, possibly a couple thousand 1861-1862.
(bold mine)
With this in consideration, it's imperative that the collector carefully examine
Seated halves from these years for signs of cleaning.
In 1858, the Mint issued a new reverse hub for this coin, most easily characterized by a greater space between the tops of the L anf F in HALF; the first hub had the serifs almost touching. Given the very small mintages of San Francisco Halves in these years, combined with the 24 reverse dies provided in 1856 and 1857, the new reverse die was not actually used until 1862. There are, therefore, two different reverse die types found with 1862-S
Seated halves. A total of 5 dies were used: 2 Hub 1 dies with a large mint mark, 1 Hub 1 die with a Medium mint mark, and 2 Hub 2 dies with a Small mint mark. The Small mint mark used the same punch for both dies, and that punch was broken at the top of the S, leading to a unique "broken" S mint mark on these coins.
The seminal work of identifying Seated Half die varieties was done by Randy Wiley and Bill Bugert in their book,
The Complete Guide to Liberty Seated Half Dollars; the varieties they enunciated are listed as WB-xxx for each year. The 1862-S varieties I mentioned above are WB-101, WB-102, and WB-103 for this year, respectively. WB-101 is by far the most common; WB-102 and WB-103 are R4+ at any grade above VF and pretty much unknown in Mint State - all of the Heritage examples mentioned above, as far as I could tell, were WB-101.
Presented for your viewing pleasure below is an example of WB-103. Note the broken mint mark and the space between the L and F which identifies this variety.
Posted 04/25/2009 4:11 pm
