Washingtoniana
Circa 1860 Washington Star Obverse / Equestrian muling by George H. Lovett. Musante GW-278, Baker-98M, var. Silver. Reeded edge. MS-66 (PCGS).
31.6 mm. 201.5 grains. A most handsome medal with generous light silver gray surfaces accented by soft blue, green, rose and golden brown toning in the deeply prooflike fields. The devices are satiny and sharp, as are the crisply reeded edges and rims which feel sharp to the touch. In his October 1864 sale, W. Elliot Woodward wrote that this medal was unique in silver, the dies having been owned by his consignor, J. Osborn Emery, who had relayed this information. In his 88th sale, in June 1886, Woodward revised this to state that two had been struck in silver before the dies were destroyed. Remarkably, this is the second one we have handled in the span of a year; the other was in the landmark collection of William Spohn Baker. As that collection was largely bought by a single collector with the intent of keeping the collection intact, it is likely that the Baker specimen had only that one brief entry into the marketplace and that this one will be the only one available for a generation. Interestingly, this seems to follow the pattern of this medal, as it has been 45 years since it was last sold. This muling in silver was unknown to Rulau and Fuld.
PCGS# 784218.
From the E Pluribus Unum Collection. Earlier from Pine Tree’s Altman-Haffner Sale, April 1975, lot 753.
Estimate: $110