(1863) Silver Civil War Store Card F-40a-1fo, Philip Bach MI

Coin Details

Auction Record

$4,320 MS64 10-14-2020 Stack's Bowers

Description

Civil War-era store card from Philip Bach of Michigan. Michigan's merchants across numerous cities actively produced tokens to combat the small change shortage affecting Northern commerce. This piece is an overstrike struck over a host coin, an 1863 Indian Head cent. Traces of the original design may be visible beneath the new impressions. Token manufacturers struck pieces by the thousands, using hand-fed screw presses capable of producing several hundred tokens per hour. Between 1862 and 1864, Northern merchants produced millions of private tokens to compensate for the disappearance of federal coinage. The silver composition indicates a piece produced outside the normal commercial run, as a numismatic item. The cent-sized format was chosen deliberately to match the federal Indian Head cent, the coin most conspicuously absent from daily commerce.

Rarity Notes

Silver strikings are considerably scarcer than base metal versions, typically produced in small quantities for collectors or as special presentation pieces. Overstrike varieties are generally scarcer than tokens struck on blank planchets, as they required sourcing and re-striking existing coins. With 1 cataloged varieties, Philip Bach was a limited producer of Civil War tokens.

Cross References

Fuld 40a-1fo