1797 Half Eagle Pattern - J-24

Coin Details

Auction Record

$17,250 PR50 01-01-2009 Heritage Auctions

Description

Cataloged as Judd-24 (Pollock-40) and be unique, the 1797 copper half eagle pattern is an extraordinary survival from the earliest years of American gold coinage. Both the obverse and reverse dies were used to produce the extremely rare 1797 Small Eagle BD-4 variety half eagle. A key diagnostic is the berry on the right side of the reverse wreath falling inside rather than outside the wreath — the identifying feature of the BD-4 die marriage. Struck in copper with a reeded edge. This piece is an original die trial from 1797, not a later restrike. After striking, the coin was deliberately defaced at the Mint to prevent potential counterfeiting — gilding a copper piece to pass as a five-dollar gold coin would have been straightforward, and five dollars represented a substantial sum in the late eighteenth century. Despite this intentional damage, the coin has survived remarkably intact and has been known to numismatic scholars since the 1890s. The BD-4 reverse die was actually known to the collecting community through this copper pattern for nearly a century before the single surviving gold example was identified. That discovery came in 1972, when Robert P. Hilt recognized a BD-4 half eagle in the Byron Reed Collection. Harry Bass later acquired it at the Reed Collection sale in October 1996, and it now resides in the Harry Bass Research Foundation. The unique status of both the copper pattern and the gold original makes this die pairing one of the most remarkable in early American numismatics.