Q. David Bowers
Reception of the dollars: So far as is known, the new 1794 silver dollars slipped into circulation and immediately began doing their duty in the channels of commerce. Despite all good intentions, when the first 1794-dated United States silver dollars reached merchants and bankers, and when their successors dated 1795, 1796, etc., did also, the Spanish-American dollars, or eight-reales pieces, were preferred over the native American product. The old eight-reales coins were worth slightly more on the market than were the sparkling new United States coins with the head of Miss Liberty on one side and an eagle on the other.
The reason is that the citizenry was familiar with the eight-reales coins, and especially in the export trade they were welcomed worldwide. Although the new United States dollars might test properly by weight or analysis, most business was done at sight, and the new coins had yet to prove their status.
By early December 1794, a few of the new dollars had traveled north to the Granite State, where the New Hampshire Gazette reported the following on December 2nd:
Some of the dollars now coining at the Mint of the United States have found their way to this town. A correspondent put one into the editor's hands yesterday. Its weight is equal to that of the Spanish dollar but the metal appears finer. One side bears a head, with flowing tresses, encircled by Fifteen Stars, and has the word "LIBERTY" at the top, and the date, 1794, at the bottom. On the reverse, is the Bald Eagle, enclosed in an Olive Branch, round which are the words "One Dollar, or Unit, Hundred Cents." The tout ensemble has a pleasing effect to a connoisseur; but the touches of the graver are too delicate, and there is a want of that boldness of execution which is necessary to durability and currency.
Numismatic historian Don Taxay viewed the 1794 dollar as unsatisfactory, noted that engraver Robert Scot's "talents, never marked, show a rapid decline." (U.S. Mint and Coinage, p. 106). He took the position that Mint Director Rittenhouse's successor (after June 1795), William DeSaussure, did not like Scot's work, and, apparently, not his assistant Gardner's either, and in September 1795 went over the heads of Scot and Gardner to enlist an outside artist, John Eckstein, to redesign the dollar and replace the Flowing Hair motif with the Draped Bust obverse, Small Eagle reverse, type.
I, for one, disagree with Don Taxay-and find the Scot and or Gardner work on 1794-1795 Flowing Hair coins to be very attractive, not only on the early dollars, but on half cents, large cents, half dimes, and half dollars as well. Unfortunately, very few contemporary accounts survive to tell us of the contemporary public reception of the newly minted 1794 silver dollars and their use in commerce. Coins were taken for granted, and relatively little notice was taken in print concerning them.
All too often, historians judge by today's standards what happened two centuries ago. In 1794, the almighty Spanish-American dollar, showing "that boldness of execution which is necessary to durability and currency," had little in the way of aesthetic appeal. Depicting the kings of Spain and, earlier, the Pillars of Hercules and two globes, these coins had virtually no fine detailing. The dies were made quickly, and crudely. By contrast, we have it on the word of an unnamed editor of a New Hampshire newspaper that the new 1794 United States silver dollar had "a pleasing effect to a connoisseur." What more could be asked for?
Numismatic Information
Desirability of the 1794 dollar: Today, the 1794 dollar is recognized as a great classic, not only because it is rare, but because it stands as the first silver dollar produced by the fledgling Philadelphia Mint. From the inception of coin auction sales on a large scale in the 1860s, to the present day, the appearance of a 1794 silver dollar in an auction usually has provided the opportunity for the cataloguer to provide an extended comment. Similarly, 1794 dollars have occupied the spotlight in numerous dealers' fixed-price lists over the years.
Charles Steigerwalt, in The Coin Journal, September 1880, commented as follows concerning the 1794 dollar:
The number of pieces coined in this year was not large and they have become very rare. Good specimens bring about 50 dollars. The dies of the dollars and half dollars of this year were not sharp and the impressions are generally weak; good specimens being difficult to obtain.
When Ebenezer Locke Mason wrote Rare American Coins: Their Description, and Past and Present Fictitious Values, in 1887, he focused upon this coin and noted the following:
The 1794 United States silver dollar, which occupies the centre of the group in our illustration [a collage of coins at the top of the page], was authorized by an act of Congress, April 2, 1792, and was struck at the old Mint, opposite Filbert Street, in Seventh Street, Philadelphia, and is still standing. This dollar, which is considered very rare, commanded a premium of about $25 in 1860, and has steadily advanced in fictitious value from year to year, and commanded, in every condition, in 1885, the sum of three hundred dollars.
It is said that but few of the 1794 dollars were struck, and the earliest from the dies equaled Proof pieces in their glistening splendor. The British Museum contains the best known specimen of the 1794 dollar, and probably received it as a gift from our government the year it was coined. (In a conversation with the author, August 6, 1992, Jack Collins stated that in the course of his research involving 1794 dollars he had learned that the specimen in the British Museum had been cleaned to the extent that it now shows extensive hairlines. Also, this was not a gift from any government, but came from the estate of Sara Sophia Banks who bought it from Captain Hawkins Whitshed in 1796.)