The Coinage Act of 1792 provided for a gold eagle, half eagle and quarter eagle, but gold did not reach the Mint in quantity until 1795. On July 31 of that year the chief coiner returned 744 half eagles, the first gold coins of the United States, and further deliveries through mid-September brought the year's total to 8,707. The eagle followed in the autumn and the quarter eagle in 1796.
Chief Engraver Robert Scot designed the coin. His Liberty faces right under a tall soft cap, a headdress that has been called a turban, a pileus or a mob cap without fitting any of them exactly. For the reverse he drew a slender eagle standing on a palm branch and holding a wreath in its beak; Walter Breen traced the bird to a Roman onyx cameo of the first century now in Vienna. No value appears on either side. Gold, as John Dannreuther puts it, was traded by tale, and merchants and foreign mints judged a coin by its weight and fineness.
In 1798 the small eagle gave way to a larger heraldic eagle with a shield on its breast, arrows and an olive branch in its claws, the motto E PLURIBUS UNUM on a scroll and a field of stars above. The Mint used dies until they wore out, so the change did not follow the dates on the coins. Obverse dies dated 1795 and 1797 that were still usable were paired with the new reverse in 1798, and an old small eagle reverse struck a handful of coins dated 1798. Overdates follow the same habit: the Mint struck no half eagles dated 1801, then re-cut its unused 1801 dies so that every half eagle of 1802 is an 1802/1, and every one of 1803 an 1803/2.
Yearly deliveries ran from 3,609 in 1797 to 64,093 in 1806. In 1807 John Reich's new design replaced Scot's, and half eagles dated 1807 exist in both styles.
