Q. David Bowers
"Since the Director specifically requests permission to enlarge his numismatic sideline, we can assume that he did not consider the proposal entirely beyond reproach. Possibly, in the back of his mind, he recalled the terse statements in the laws of 1792 and 1837 which specified that all coins bear the year of their issue! Thus, if permission had been granted, we can be sure that Snowden would have preserved it as he did other important records. Furthermore, the 'new arrangement' was to establish rules and regulations for the distribution of the restrikes, 'an exact amount of which (would) be kept and rendered to the department.' The absence of any such records must therefore be taken as conclusive evidence that Snowden's proposal did not meet with the approbation of the Secretary of the Treasury. We can well imagine the director's discomfiture at the refusal of his harmless request. News of the 'great dispensation had already been bruited about by Clayton and others who were waiting on tenterhooks for the fateful hour. In such a situation what could poor James Ross do?
"The best answer can, perhaps, be found in a correspondence between the Philadelphia coin dealer Edward Cogan and Director Snowden, On June 14, 1859, Cogan writes:
" 'I have been applied to by a great many collectors of American coins wishing to be informed whether the report now current-that there are many of the pattern cents being restruck at the Mint for the purpose of exchanging them for Washington pieces is true-the only answer I can give is that the many pieces shown me lately would tend to confirm the report. A rumor of this kind uncontradicted will tend to depreciate the value of every fine piece in whatever collection it may be found and I should be glad if you would give it the most unqualified denial.
"Snowden replied:
" 'It is quite true that I have caused a number of pattern or specimen cents to be struck for the purpose of exchanging them for Washington pieces whenever opportunities to do so occur. If you possess any Washington pieces I would be much obliged if you will send me a list of them, and if there are any among them which I desire for the Cabinet I would be pleased to procure them by giving you in exchange other interesting medals or coins.'
"The above letter, as frank as it is accommodating, unravels the 'Gordian knot' in a multitude of Mint mysteries. It solves for one thing the enigma of why the 1856 Flying Eagle cent, which W.C. Prime listed in 1861 as 'Rarity 5' of six categories, it today far more common than any other single pattern. It explains also the sudden appearance of a dozen different varieties of this famous cent in the collections of prominent Philadelphia numismatists, and the conspicuous absence of all but the original from the Cabinet of the Mint.
"There is but little doubt that behind much of Snowden's complacency lay the belief that he was only acting in the long line of Mint tradition."
Taxay on the 1804 $1 (1963)
The following is from Counterfeit, Mis-struck and Unofficial Coins, by Don Taxay, page 82:
"In 1842, the four-year-old Mint collection appeared in the first numismatic edition published in the United States, A Manual of Gold & Silver Coins of All Nations, by Jacob Eckfeldt and William DuBois-'assayers of the Mint of the U.S.' One curious feature of the Eckfeldt-DuBois book was an engraving of an 1804 silver dollar, a coin which, a few years earlier, was unknown either in the Mint Cabinet or in any U.S. collection.
"In 1843, Matthew Stickney discovered not one but two 1804 dollars at the Philadelphia Mint and obtained one of the pieces in trade for an Immune Columbia cent struck in gold, together with several smaller coins from his own collection. The transaction is described by Stickney in a letter to Edward Cogan, July 2, 1867:
" 'Of the genuineness of my U.S. dollar of 1804 I think there cannot be entertained a doubt, as it was handed me directly from the cabinet of the U.S. Mint in Philadelphia on the 9th of May, 1843, by one of its officers (William E. DuBois) who still holds the same situation there and can testify to it. It was not then considered any more valuable than any other of the series, and I only desired it to help make up the chronological series, which I perhaps was the first to attempt to make of U.S. coins.'
"Within the next quarter of a century two other 1804 dollars were allegedly culled from circulation, one in a Philadelphia bank, the other, in 1865, in a Richmond, Virginia exchange office. These became known as the Mickley and Cohen dollars after the cabinets in which they resided.
"In 1868 a fifth specimen was purchased by E.H. Sanford from an elderly lady who claimed to have obtained it (for the price of one dollar) from the Mint during Polk's administration. This subsequently became known as the Parmelee specimen. In 1884, a sixth identical dollar was purchased in Berlin from the Adolph Weyl collection by Messrs. S.H. and H. Chapman of Philadelphia. A seventh 1804 dollar turned up in England, and was purchased at a Glendining sale in 1917.
"Two years after the discovery of the Mickley dollar, Stickney, in cataloguing his collection, wrote, 'As regards the authenticity of other specimens of the U.S. dollar of 1804, I have no knowledge. Those having dollars of that date (Cohen and Mickley) were not then known to the Mint as collectors as appears by the list of which I send to you a copy, then obtained, 1843, from Mr. DuBois, which remains, in his handwriting, in my possession ... .'
"Before long, a vehement discussion arose over the merits of each of the seven 1804 dollars. Stickney and Parmelee regarded as conclusive evidence of authenticity the fact that their pieces could be traced directly to the Mint. Cohen and Mickley, as would be expected, argued with an opposite logic.
"Modern scholars, however, are of the opinion that none of the alleged 'originals' could have been struck before the renovation of Mint machinery, 1832-36. There are several reasons for this:
"First of all, the coins show indisputable evidence of having been struck in a tightly fitting collar, of the type not used at the Mint prior to that time. (This collar was first noted in connection with the Gobrecht dollars and halves of 1836, when it was said 'to give a mathematical equality to the diameters.) The edge lettering, which was applied previous to the striking, is flattened-a result of the planchet being forced against the collar under pressure of the blow.
"Secondly, the beaded border present on all specimens was introduced on silver coins in 1828, and not noted on the dollar prior to 1836. This border, with a raised blank rim around it, was specifically mentioned by the Mint Director, Samuel Moore, in a letter of August 8, 1829, to Secretary of the Treasury S.D. Ingham, relating to the half dimes of 1829, 'like the Dimes this year, superior to any coins heretofore issued.'
"Thirdly, it was not until 1817 that facilities for making Proofs (such as the Stickney and Mint Cabinet specimens) were introduced in the United States.
"Fourthly, the top-most curl of Liberty's hair is cropped off in a manner unlike that on any genuine silver dollars of the 1795-1803 period, though it is identical to that on the Proof restrike dollars of '1801.'
"Fifthly, the date and letter punches are almost identical to those on the 1804 (plain 4) restrike eagle, and the reverse is the same as that of the restrike dollars of 1801, 1802 and 1803. And finally, the 1804s are first recorded as being extant, in 1842. Furthermore, the missing top curl and modern letter punches indicate that the dies for the 1804 dollar are not much older than the coins themselves!
"In 1858, a second chapter was added to the confusion when the son of George Eckfeldt, who had charge of the dies in the engraver's department, surreptitiously struck off several plain edge specimens using a new reverse die. (Per Newman-Bressett, The Fantastic 1804 Dollar.) Ebenezer Mason, in reminiscing about his early days as a coin dealer on 2nd Street, Philadelphia (Mason's Coin Collector's Magazine, June 1882), further tells us that: 'Here was offered by young Eckfeldt three genuine U.S. 1804 dollars at $70 each, and nearly all the rare 1/2 cents in dozens of duplicates were purchased.'