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 Replies: 11 / Views: 5,101 |
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Pillar of the Community
United States
689 Posts |
Looking for all and any info on this please. I'm starting to get into tokens and medals a little, but I'm not sure where to find my info at. I have the RedBook for u.s.tokens and medals but couldn't find this one.  Any help is as always greatly appreciated. Thanks!   Identified - moved to Tokens forum - Sap |
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Valued Member
United States
425 Posts |
Many tokens, credits and "chits" were used during the American Civil War. Often a soldier could give his pay to a sutler,(follower of the Army that provided soldiers with the things they needed and "wanted"), and in return he would get credits toward merchandise. The idea being that if you had only tokens for trade to a sutler then you had no money to waste on gambleing, women, and drink........but everyone would take/used these tokens just like real cash.
This one is odd as it has a War time date...... but nothing to tell us what it is worth. This may mean that it is a token used AFTER the War. After the war there were clubs like the GAR,(Grand Army of the Republic), that were very much like our VFW's of today. Often in these clubs tokens or chips would be provided to avoid using real money in card games and other "Gameing".
Also, for many years after the War, reunions and encampments were held to bring the old Vets back together on the battlefields. Tokens and medals were passed out to the Veterans as well as reproduction uniforms and buttons. These things play heck with the metel-detector and relic hunter guys!
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Pillar of the Community
United States
1000 Posts |
Here is a link to one on ebay like yours. Our Union CWTCivil war tokens either have a store name on it or they have a patriotic slogan on it. So they are categorized as either A Civil War Token Store Card or Patriotic Civil War Token. Yours is a Patriotic Token. Copied from a previous response I made to another poster: Quote:
What you have is a "Patriotic" civil war token. They also made "store card" civil war tokens that would have local merchant advertisements on it.
According to George and Melvin Fuld (The true experts)
There was a shortage of small cents, due to hording. To fill this void some very entrepreneurial individuals decided to start minting there own small cents, they were able to make them for about 23/100ths of a cent, so they made a handsome profit.
Over 25 Million tokens were minted and were generally accepted by merchants filling the void for the missing cents. A railroad company tried to redeem a large number of these tokens to one of the private mints, which went over like a lead balloon. So the Congress swiftly passed an act in 1864 to make it illegal for any private individuals to issue any type of money. This evening I will take a look in my guide to give you the Fuld number for your token. You can than use it to figure out how rare the token is. |
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Pillar of the Community
United States
4416 Posts |
This is a relatively common patriotic, worth about $15-20. These tokens of which more than 10,000 varieties exist were in general, public use during the Civil War. It's a stretch to connect these to sutlers, some of whom did issue their own tokens and paper money of sorts. Sutler tokens and many varieties of Civil War tokens are far rarer than most coins, but dollar-wise not worth as much as so-called "rare" coins. For example, one could now purcase two nice sutler tokens (maybe 10-20 known) for the price of an average circulated 1909-S VDB Lincoln Cent of which tens of thousands exist. One can attend any coin show and find 1909-S VDB's in dealer cases. Yet, you'd be hard-pressed to find many of the common varieties of Civil War tokens, much less one sutler token at a local coin show. |
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Pillar of the Community
 United States
689 Posts |
what books do you guys use for identification and information?
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Pillar of the Community
United States
689 Posts |
also id like to say thanks for all the help provided. As I said I'm new to tokens so expect some more simpleton questions from me.
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Pillar of the Community
United States
689 Posts |
anyone come up with an ID # for this one yet?
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Pillar of the Community
United States
1000 Posts |
Sorry Jake...I forgot about ya... The Fuld Number is 178/267 in copper According to my 1965 guide it is a R-1 which means it is a common token with over 5000 examples in existence. Quote:
what books do you guys use for identification and information? I use the original 1965 "Patriotic Civil War Tokens" by George and Melvin Fuld & "A Guide to Civil War Store Card Tokens" by George and Melvin Fuld |
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Pillar of the Community
United States
1000 Posts |
By the way The Fuld number seems to be the accepted way to identify a token in the CWT world, As you might have seen in the ebay auction the coin was identified as HG 924 This was from an earlier attempt to categorize CWT's by Authors Hetrich and Guttag. |
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Pillar of the Community
United States
689 Posts |
thank you very much mint marq
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Pillar of the Community
United States
4416 Posts |
One can often find an early, 1960-62, card cover, Fuld patriotic booklet online for under $10. This booklet is fairly useful, even though the later and more costly editions have naturally been updated. Rulau's token book also can be useful. For a list of useful reference books, check out the "Civil War Token Society" website: http://cwtsociety.com/books.htmlFuld numbered the patriotic dies which were mixed and matched to create different varieties. The lower numbered dies of different pairings are considered to be the obverses. Your token's obverse is # 178, and the reverse is die # 267. The Fulds, George & Melvin, then estimated and assigned rarity ratings to each variety, R-1 being 5,000 or more and R-10 being unique. Their work was a tremendous undertaking when one considers that there are over 10,000 varieties, including both patriotics and storecards. |
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Pillar of the Community
United States
4416 Posts |
Here's a comparable Civil War token that's up for bids on ebay: 400198309348Bidding seems to be strong on this one, likely given the pictorial appeal of the rider on horseback. |
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Replies: 11 / Views: 5,101 |
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Posted 02/28/2011 10:15 am
