1852 $10 U.S. Assay Office MS(PCGS#10001)

Summer 2025 Global Showcase Auction U.S. Coins

Auctioneer

Stack's Bowers

Lot Number

3492

Grade

AU50

Price

13,200

Lot Description

A predominantly honey-rose example with blushes of warmer pinkish-red tinting that appear to drift toward the borders. Well struck for type, and well defined at the assigned grade level, there are also remnants of mint luster to confirm the AU rating from PCGS.<p>Earlier private minting operations in California were effectively shut down in 1851 due to assays by Jacob R. Eckfeldt and William E. Du Bois revealing that many of these coins were worth less than their stated denominations, as well as damning exposés by James King. Moffat & Co.'s coins were largely unaffected and the firm kept producing desperately needed lower denomination coins. John Little Moffat retired in February of 1852 from the firm he founded, which promptly dissolved. Moffat & Co.'s original contract to issue gold ingots and coins on behalf of the federal government was transferred to its successor, the United States Assay Office of Gold, headed by Joseph R. Curtis, Philo H. Perry and Samuel H. Ward. As part of the original terms of the government contract, the Assay Office of Gold was prohibited from issuing any "ingot" in denominations under $50, therefore not providing any relief from the chronic coin shortages that plagued the gold bearing regions. Repeated petitions went unheeded until finally the Treasury relented and permitted the USAOG to produce coins in $10 and $20 denominations. These pieces found an immediately receptive audience and they circulated widely until the San Francisco Mint could finally meet the need.