1822 Capped Head Half Eagle

A common coin that vanished

Nothing about the 1822 half eagle was meant to be special. The $5 gold piece was the workhorse of early American gold: struck year in and year out from 1795 to 1916, missing only 1801, 1816 and 1817 among dates before World War I. Its 1822 design was the Capped Head, an 1813 modification of engraver John Reich's Capped Bust Left portrait, with a larger Liberty facing left and an eagle on the reverse marked 5 D. The coin measured about 25 mm and was struck to the original standard of about 8.75 grams of .9167 gold.

The Mint reported 17,796 half eagles for 1822, a typical number for the decade. The Assay Commission's records show batches delivered to the Treasurer on March 25, May 24 and 27, August 6, October 26 and November 2, 1822, and January 24, 1823. Three coins from each delivery were set aside, and on March 10, 1823, all 21 were melted and assayed. No Mint document records what date those coins bore.

That gap is the heart of the mystery. Early Mints routinely kept using older dated dies, and many of the half eagles delivered in 1822 were likely dated 1820 or 1821. One researcher has suggested that potentially none of them carried the 1822 date and that 1822-dated coins may even have been struck after those dated 1823 and 1824. Survival rates for early half eagles typically run well under 1% of the recorded mintage, so three survivors could simply be what is left of a run of a few hundred.

The world in 1822

James Monroe's Era of Good Feelings was at its height. On March 30 the United States combined East Florida with part of West Florida into the Florida Territory. In April, settlers sponsored by the American Colonization Society landed at Cape Mesurado in West Africa, founding the town that became Monrovia, the capital of Liberia. On July 2, Denmark Vesey was hanged in Charleston, South Carolina, for plotting a slave rebellion, and on July 4 a 24th star, for Missouri, was added to the flag.

Abroad, Brazil declared its independence from Portugal on September 7, and Jean-François Champollion announced on September 27 that he had deciphered Egyptian hieroglyphs using the Rosetta Stone. In Britain, Charles Babbage proposed his difference engine. By 1834 the gold in a half eagle had been worth more than its face value for several years, and Congress cut the coin's gold content that year.

Three coins, three paths

The first 1822 to reach a collection never left the government. It was probably saved by Adam Eckfeldt, the Mint's chief coiner, who gathered a collection for the Mint unofficially before 1838 and officially after. The coin is worn and nicked, set aside only after years of handling, and it has been in the Mint Cabinet, now the National Numismatic Collection at the Smithsonian, ever since.

The second was the coin of Harlan Page Smith, a principal of a New York coin firm, who liked to say he had plucked it from a bullion dealer's stock for $6.50. When the great Lorin Parmelee collection went to auction in June 1890, Parmelee's own 1822 turned out to be counterfeit, and Smith put his coin into the sale to keep the collection complete, then bought it back for $900. After Smith's death, his coin sold in Philadelphia on May 8, 1906, for $2,165, a record for any U.S. coin. 'An 1822 half eagle... brought $2,165,' The Numismatist reported. '1804 dollars must now take a back seat.' The buyer, William Forrester Dunham of Chicago, outbid John H. Clapp.

After Dunham's death his collection went to B. Max Mehl, who put the 1822 on the cover of his 1941 Dunham catalog. Its price was announced as $11,575, though the actual figure was somewhat less, and the coin had in fact been sold before the catalog was printed. It passed through Cincinnati collector Charles Williams and Texas businessman Amon Carter Sr. before Carter's son sold it in the late 1950s to the pharmaceutical magnate Josiah K. Lilly. Lilly died in 1966. An Act of Congress for the relief of his estate, enacted June 4, 1968, allowed his gold collection to be given to the Smithsonian in lieu of estate taxes, and on June 13, 1968, a truck delivered 6,113 gold coins to the museum's loading dock. From that day, only one 1822 half eagle could ever be privately owned.

The coin that stayed in private hands

The third coin surfaced in 1899 with Moritz David, a German-born dealer living on East 112th Street in New York who mostly dealt in European coins and medals. On August 14, 1899, he invoiced Virgil Brand of Chicago, the most acquisitive collector of U.S. coins there ever was, for four early half eagles, charging $800 for the 1822. Brand bought 4,471 specimens that year for $7,464.77; the 1822 alone was more than a tenth of it. One account traces the coin further back, to a nineteenth-century sale of the Hiram E. Deats collection, where the lot did not sell.

Brand's coins were unseen until after his death in 1926, when his brothers Armin and Horace fought over the estate. A court settled the division in 1937, and the 1822 went to Armin. In 1945 Louis E. Eliasberg Sr., who was trying to complete a set of every U.S. coin by date and mint, sent the dealer Abe Kosoff to get it. The asking price was $15,000. After some haggling by telephone, Kosoff's partner Abner Kreisberg told Eliasberg, 'make it $14,000 and I'll deliver the coin to you.' Eliasberg said okay. With the 1822, his became the only complete collection of U.S. coins ever formed.

Eliasberg lent it widely; over a million people saw it at a special Bicentennial exhibition at the Philadelphia Mint in 1976. When his gold coins were sold in New York in October 1982, the 1822 brought $687,500, tying the 1870-S $3 gold piece in the same sale for the record for any U.S. Mint coin at auction. The buyer was the young D. Brent Pogue, who made it the centerpiece of his collection of early half eagles.

In May 2016 it was offered from the Pogue collection, with a reserve, in New York. Bidding reached $6.4 million and the coin did not sell. On March 25, 2021, the coin was offered again in Las Vegas and sold for $8,400,000, including the buyer's premium, the most ever paid at auction for a gold coin struck by the U.S. Mint, more than any 1913 Liberty nickel, 1804 dollar or 1933 double eagle had brought to that date.

What makes it the one

Of the three known coins, the Brand-Eliasberg-Pogue example is the finest, graded About Uncirculated 50 by PCGS. The Mint Cabinet coin is worn and nicked. The Smith-Dunham-Lilly coin is the one shown on the cover of the 1941 Dunham catalog.

The half eagle is the denomination that makes completeness possible, and that is what drives the 1822's fame. Nineteenth-century collectors prized complete date runs, and the 1822 is the coin without which no set of U.S. half eagles, and no complete set of U.S. coins, can be finished. Before 2021 an 1822 half eagle had sold at auction only twice, in 1906 and 1982, and in more than 120 years the privately held coin has belonged to just a handful of collectors.

The numbers

Mintage

17,796 reported for 1822 (one source gives 17,795); the number actually dated 1822 is unknown

Known survivors

3 (2 in the Smithsonian, 1 private)

Weight

About 8.75 grams (pre-1834 standard)

Diameter

About 25 mm (large diameter, used through 1829)

Composition

.9167 gold, the balance copper and silver

Designer

Based on John Reich's Capped Bust Left (1807); Capped Head modification introduced 1813

Finest known

PCGS AU50, the Brand-Eliasberg-Pogue coin

Timeline

1. 1813

   The Capped Head modification of John Reich's half eagle design is introduced.

2. Mar 25, 1822

   The first of the year's half eagle deliveries reaches the Treasurer; others follow in May, August, October and November.

3. Mar 10, 1823

   Twenty-one half eagles set aside from the 1822 deliveries are melted and assayed.

4. 1838

   The Mint's coin collection, begun unofficially by chief coiner Adam Eckfeldt, gains official standing; its worn 1822 half eagle has stayed in government hands ever since.

5. Jun 1890

   Parmelee's 1822 proves counterfeit; Harlan Page Smith substitutes his own coin in the sale and buys it back for $900.

6. Aug 14, 1899

   Moritz David invoices Virgil Brand $800 for this coin.

7. May 8, 1906

   The Smith coin sells in Philadelphia for $2,165, a record for any U.S. coin.

8. 1926

   Virgil Brand dies; his collection is caught in a dispute between his brothers.

9. 1937

   A court settles the Brand division; the 1822 goes to Armin Brand.

10. 1941

    The Smith-Dunham 1822 is featured on the cover of the Dunham collection catalog and sold privately.

11. 1945

    Louis E. Eliasberg Sr. buys the Brand coin for $14,000 to complete his collection.

12. Jun 13, 1968

    The Lilly gold collection, including the Smith-Dunham 1822, is delivered to the Smithsonian.

13. 1976

    The Eliasberg 1822 is shown at a Bicentennial exhibition at the Philadelphia Mint seen by over a million people.

14. Oct 1982

    At the Eliasberg gold sale in New York, D. Brent Pogue buys the coin for $687,500.

15. May 2016

    Offered from the Pogue collection in New York, it fails to meet its reserve after a $6.4 million bid.

16. Mar 25, 2021

    It sells at auction in Las Vegas for $8,400,000.

The world in 1822

• Mar 30, 1822

  The United States forms the Florida Territory.

• Apr 25, 1822

  The American Colonization Society lands at Cape Mesurado; the settlement becomes Monrovia, Liberia.

• Jul 2, 1822

  Denmark Vesey is hanged in Charleston for plotting a slave rebellion.

• Jul 3, 1822

  Charles Babbage publishes his proposal for a difference engine.

• Jul 4, 1822

  A 24th star, for Missouri, is added to the U.S. flag.

• Sep 7, 1822

  Brazil declares its independence from Portugal.

• Sep 27, 1822

  Jean-François Champollion announces his decipherment of Egyptian hieroglyphs.

• Dec 1, 1822

  Pedro I is crowned the first Emperor of Brazil.

Price record

A realized auction price is what a buyer actually paid on the date shown, including the buyer's premium where the sale reported it. It is the strongest kind of reference price, and it is a record of one sale of one object on one day, not a promise of what the next example will bring.

By reference price, 1822 Capped Head Half Eagle is number 5 of 100 in the coins entries of the FLOAT 100. 96 of those 100 rest on a realized sale; the rest carry an asking price or a guide value, and each page says which. Rank within the FLOAT 100 itself (4 here) is editorial: how much an object defines its field, not price alone.

Did you know

• Harlan Page Smith said he found his 1822 in a bullion dealer's stock for $6.50.
• Lorin Parmelee's 1822, in one of the greatest 19th-century collections, turned out to be a counterfeit.
• Virgil Brand paid $800 for this coin in 1899, more than a tenth of everything he spent on 4,471 coins that year.
• It took an Act of Congress, in 1968, to put the second 1822 into the Smithsonian for good.
• Without this coin, Louis Eliasberg's collection, the only complete set of U.S. coins ever formed, would have been incomplete.
• Its $687,500 price in 1982 came when no coin had yet reached seven figures at auction.