No Date Bronze Medal J-PE-37, Daniel Webster

Coin Details

Auction Record

$100 MS61BN 11-09-2022 Stack's Bowers

Description

The undated bronze medal Julian PE-37 honors Daniel Webster (1782-1852), the legendary orator, statesman, and constitutional lawyer who served as U.S. Senator from Massachusetts, Secretary of State under three presidents, and the foremost advocate for the preservation of the Union in the decades preceding the Civil War. Webster's speeches, including the famous "Reply to Hayne" (1830) and "Seventh of March" (1850) address, established him as the most powerful public speaker in American congressional history. The obverse features a portrait bust of Webster, capturing the dark, commanding features and massive brow that contemporaries described as almost superhuman in their intensity. Webster's physical presence was legendary — his deep-set eyes, described by Thomas Carlyle as "dull anthracite furnaces," and his booming voice could hold the Senate chamber in rapt attention for hours. The inscriptions identify the honoree, with the absence of a date placing this medal in the undated category of U.S. Mint personal medals that were produced over extended periods as demand warranted. The reverse carries a commemorative design appropriate to Webster's political legacy, with the Julian PE-37 catalog number identifying its place in Robert W. Julian's comprehensive classification of U.S. Mint personal medals. Webster was one of the "Great Triumvirate" of pre-Civil War senators alongside Henry Clay and John C. Calhoun, and his medallic portrait reflects the reverence in which he was held by subsequent generations. The U.S. Mint produced personal medals of prominent Americans throughout the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, maintaining dies that could be struck to order for government officials, foreign dignitaries, and private purchasers.

Rarity Notes

U.S. Mint bronze medal, undated. Julian PE-37. Produced by the Mint over an extended period as demand warranted. Surviving examples vary in condition depending on the era of striking.

Cross References

PCGS #528675; NGC #951763 (Julian medals); Julian PE-37; Daniel Webster (1782-1852)