1862 $1 MS(PCGS#6952)

June 2026 Showcase Auction U.S. Coins

Auctioneer

Stack's Bowers

Lot Number

4009

Grade

AU50

Price

5,856

Lot Description

OC Die State a/a. A bright, brilliant example with a softly frosted to modestly semi-reflectivity appearance. With the bonanza years at the Comstock still more than a decade into the future and the Chinese continuing to give preference to the Mexican dollar, it is little wonder that silver dollar coinage reverted to pre-1859 levels once the nation had more serious concerns after the outbreak of civil war in April 1861. Mintages for this denomination plummeted, beginning with a precipitous drop to just 11,540 coins in 1862. In fact, had lawmakers not been too preoccupied with the Civil War and its aftermath to turn their attention to such a trivial matter, silver dollar coinage may have ceased entirely after the short-lived demand of 1859 to 1861 had been met. By the early 1850s, the Mint had already recognized the silver dollar as anomalous within the U.S. coinage system, absent from and unwanted in domestic circulation, and even a failure in the export trade given its inability to effectively compete with Spanish colonial and Mexican dollars in the Far East. The judgement that the silver dollar served no useful purpose in commerce was initially made by Mint Director James Ross Snowden and echoed by his predecessor James Pollock (in office collectively from June 1853 to September 1866). A final decision was not forthcoming until after the conflict, however, and the Philadelphia Mint maintained limited yearly silver dollar production at the request of bullion depositors throughout the Civil War and early Reconstruction eras. Once again, the coins were requested solely for use in the export trade, and most were eventually melted.<p>The 1862 is one of the scarcest silver dollars of the early 1860s, with only 300 to 350 coins believed extant in all grades. Most were exported to China (and melted) or Latin America (some of these returned to the United States in later years). Contrary to what is sometime reported in cataloging, dollars were not included in the huge quantities of silver coins sold at a premium in New York City when hoarding commenced early in the Civil War, as none had been in domestic circulation in the East or Midwest for more than a decade. This hoarding concerned only subsidiary silver, which was then sent to Canada in such quantity that it sparked what one contemporary writer described as the "American silver nuisance."