By Jack D. Young, Early American Coppers (EAC), and the Dark Side Group ……
In a past CoinWeek article, I reviewed a “family” of counterfeits based on a 1799 variety of the Draped Bust silver dollar, Large Eagle reverse, with various dated obverses. I have also previously discussed the “mix and match” approach employed by counterfeiters of using various dies for their fakes. And along those lines, we now have the combination featured in this installment of “Fun with Fakes”!
As in my previous articles, this one will start with a recent “Bay” listing:
Running through the attribution of this coin resulted in NO matches; there are only two varieties of the 1798 Small Eagle reverse and this one isn’t either.
The obverse looked familiar when I saw it, but it didn’t match with this reverse. And the reverse looked familiar, but not with this obverse!
The obverse is the same as used in this “1798” example from the previously mentioned article, mated to the counterfeit 1799 Large Eagle reverse with common marks.
A little digging yielded the source of the Small Eagle reverse, also actually from another of my CoinWeek articles; this reverse is from the 1795 off-center bust dollar.
So, the first “twist” in this story is the swapping of dies from my two CoinWeek articles on counterfeit early dollars to create this new “variety”.
Searching the usual suspects on the internet yielded this same obverse, but the Large Eagle reverse example on eCRATER:
Continued searching resulted in finding this example on DHgate:
Looks like a direct match to the subject example for quite a bit less money than the eBay listing price! Fortunately, that listing was removed before a possible sale.
The next “twist” will be in finding differently dated examples with the same counterfeit combination as this 1798 Small Eagle Draped Bust dollar – I appreciate all the help I can get in finding and documenting them as the next fake “family”.
And then I found this “1799”: a different obverse but the same reverse.
Most collectors with a little experience in early U.S. dollars and a Red Book should know that the Small Eagle design was used only from 1795 through 1798 with the Draped Bust obverse, not 1799. So, this “coin” is in reality another “numismatic anomaly” – my neologism for some of these finds! Wouldn’t you know it, the seller states “1795-1798″…
Best as always,
—Jack
MORE Articles on Counterfeit Coins by Jack D. Young
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Draped Bust Dollars are my most recent obsession. They are so diverse even with the limited number of years they were minted. So many great die matches, character flaws, die breaks, etc. For someone like me who has been collecting for many decades they are a real challenge. It’s hard to know what surfaces are natural, hard to find coins with minimal defects. All to many have adjustment marks, rim dings, are cleaned, whizzed, artificially toned, or have planchet defects. Then there’s the issue of limited numbers. I can go to many shows and lucky to see one or two examples. I love any article like this that can shed any light on the subject from a new perspective. Wish there were more, on these coins especially on how to detect coins that are originals without artificial enhancements or cleaned. Thanks for writing ths.
Have you seen the stuff coming out of china 09svdbs seated dollars even silver eagles just to name a few more fake s then ever where the hobbies protection act ?
Thanks for your article. I have come across a 1799 Draped bust silver dollar counterfeit like the one in your picture…..