"1650" (ca. 1850) Pine Tree Shilling Struck Copy. Noe B. Silver. AU-50 (PCGS).

25.9 mm. 77.1 grains. Medal turn. One of the most interesting of the published Massachusetts silver copies, with a long and august provenance dating to before the Civil War. Medium silver gray with gold highlights and pale blue cabinet tones. Well centered and sharp, with a hint of glossiness from ancient polishing. The dies are crude and entirely hand cut, delightfully evocative of some numismatic criminal hunched over a piece of steel (or brass) with lust for lucre on their mind. A vertical depression right of the tree trunk is an inherent flaw. Raised bulges on either side of the X of the denomination appear to be die damage. The base of the reverse is extremely crudely lettered, suggesting double striking, though there is no evidence of multiple strikes. The entire story of this early copy is told through original documents in Crosby's Early Coins of America, pages 63 through 67. Ammi Brown of Boston was living in Salem in 1854 when a young man from Boscawen, New Hampshire offered him this coin, the one in the following lot, and several others, including three Pine Tree shillings dated 1650 and several 1652-dated pieces that were apparently genuine. One of the 1650 shillings was swapped for an Oak Tree twopence. The other two (including the one in the following lot) were acquired in exchange for Roman coins. One remained with Dr. Brown until 1858, when it was sold to Joseph Mickley, another was sold to Henry M. Brooks and then to Father Joseph Finotti (whose cabinet was sold by Woodward in 1863), and the last stayed with Brown. Brown still owned it in 1868 when he laid the story of these pieces out for Crosby, including the sad tale that the forger found religion and admitted to his numismatic crimes. Crosby offered a two page analysis, with pros and cons on the coin's potential authenticity. The positive case of their genuineness was built upon the theory that Good Samaritan shillings were proven real. Crosby was a genius, but, alas, even the best of us get it wrong sometimes. This piece and the next are fascinating relics of this earliest era of numismatic scholarship - and the tomfoolery such scholarship had to deal with.

From the E Pluribus Unum Collection. Earlier from "Mr. Getchell" of Boscawen, New Hampshire before 1854; Dr. Ammi Brown about 1854; unknown intermediaries; T. James Clarke; F.C.C. Boyd; our (Stack's) sale of the John J. Ford, Jr. Collection, Part XIV, May 2006, lot 512.