The Three Dollar Gold Piece was produced and issued for many years, from 1854 until 1889, but the it was never popular. The U.S. Mint System only produced a bit over half a million pieces over that time. The coin has bedeviled budget minded type collectors, who are looking to assemble the 12 piece type set, for years. Even the three common dates, 1854-P, 1874 and 1878 are scarce by gold type coin standards and have cost more than $300 in “collector item condition” (AU) since the 1970s. For years I thought that this coin was a product of “the gold lobby.” Another theory was that the coin made it easier to purchase 300, three cent postage stamps, which was the new rate for first class postage at the time. Conversely numismatic researcher, Roger Burdette, has pointed out the coin was authorized with the belief that it would aid making change in gold among the various denominations. Given its lack of popularity, that theory never became a wide-spread practice. I completed an 1854 PD and O set for the Three Dollar Gold Piece couple of years ago. Those mint marks stand for Philadelphia, Dahlonega and New Orleans. The Philadelphia engraving department sent dies to all four mints in 1854, but the Charlotte Mint never used their dies and allowed them to rust. The 1854 coins are unique in that the word “DOLLARS” is in small letters. In all of the later years, the letters for the denomination were larger. Therefore I consider the 1854 Three Dollar Gold Piece to be a minor type coin. The Philadelphia Three Dollar Gold Piece is by far the most common piece in the 1854 set. With a mintage of 138,618, It is one of the three most common date in the series. It is most available in AU condition although Mint State are also plentiful in the relative sense. With a mintage of only 1,120 pieces, the 1854-D Three Dollar Gold is a "dream coin" for many collectors. Despite the low mintage the number of survivors is high for the type with perhaps 325 pieces available in all grades, including the problem coins. This coin is always weakly struck to a degree and usually has so-so luster. The finest known examples have been graded MS-62. The third party grading company population reports might lead some collectors to think that this coin is somewhat common in AU. That is not the case. Many pieces have been submitted repeatedly to get the coveted Mint State grade. That has artificially inflated the number of AU graded coins reported. My last acquisition was an 1854-O Three Dollar Gold. With a mintage of 24,000, this coin is not rare, but like all Three Dollar Gold Pieces, it is scarce. Overall, the “Coin Facts” estimate for the number of survivors is 1,000 pieces. Although there are supposed to be some early die state examples of this date that are well struck, this coin is seldom seen that way. Almost all examples are weakly struck, like this piece, which actually a little above average. The 1854-O Three Dollar Gold is rare in Mint State, and the highest graded pieces are only in MS-62. The dies were frequently clashed and heavily polished, which removed a great deal of the sharpness from them. PCGS graded this coin AU-50. That is a “price threshold grade.” As the grades go up through the AU and Mint State grades, the prices go up geometrically. The U.S. Mint System probably had high hopes for the Three Dollar Gold Piece when it issued a combined mintage of 163,738 three dollar coins in 1854. Little did the mint officials realize that that mintage would be 30% of the total number of three dollar gold coins that they would issue over the next 34 years.
I remember seeing 3 dollar gold coins at the Las Vegas coin shows in Mint State. They were beautiful and the prices for those coins were so high.
Beautiful gold coins. I admit being fascinated by the Three Dollar Gold but never got to them. Thanks for posting the great pics and for the history of this coin.
thanks for another excellent article, John Milton. My impression is that original examples of the 54-D are very scarce and command high prices. I would like to have one of the O mint coins but it has been tough to find one I like at the right price. Here is my lone example, which shows the large letters on the reverse.
I pulled out my copy of Breen's encylopedia, which still has a lot of useful information, and read that in 1870, the 3$ dies that were sent to the SF mint lacked a mintmark. 2000 pieces were struck but not released, and the dies were to be returned to the Philadelphia mint, but not before the coiner added an S to one of the dies and struck a single example to be placed in the cornerstone of the new SF mint (the Granite Lady). He apparently struck an extra one, though, for "personal use." Supposedly, it had a loop attached and was possibly used as a watch fob. This coin, without the loop, found its way into the Eliasberg collection, and was sold with that set in 1982 for 687,500. I don't know where it is now.
Thanks, @johnmilton, for another interesting tutorial. I particularly enjoy your insights into strike and availability. I have posted my type set 1854 below. One question for everyone: Is there another US coin that uses the plural "DOLLARS"?
Harry Bass brought it and it is on display at the ANA museum. It another coin it same category as the 1913 V nickel in how authorized was it. Still in a category with the 1822 half eagle and the 1933 double eagle as one of the great US gold coins
The 1870-S $3 gold that Eliasberg had was the one with the loupe. It had been removed. That piece is polished and has a date scratched in on the reverse. The last I knew, no one knows where the “Grey Lady” San Francisco Mint cornerstone is located. Another 1970-S $3 gold was supposed to be in it, but no one knows if it is. Maybe that was only one, and it was “filtched.” It was understanding that the “S” mint mark was engraved in the die at the San Francisco Mint. I don’t know why the Philadelphia Mint sent a die without a mint mark to San Francisco.
Yes, that the mint in Phila would send dies to SF without a mintmark would seem to be a major mistake. I've never heard of that happening before.
The $3 gold was authorized by the coinage act of 1853 with specifications that partly related to the 1849 act (which authorized the double eagle and gold dollar): https://www.loc.gov/law/help/statutes-at-large/32nd-congress/session-2/c32s2ch79.pdf The 1853 act also reduced the silver content of the half dollar and smaller coins and led to the arrows coins. If you read it, it really doesn't specify much about the coin: You are left to infer that the weight should be 3/20ths of the Double Eagle or 3x the gold dollar. But the 1849 act doesn't specify THOSE weights, just And THAT takes us back to 1834, when the silver:gold ratio was adjusted which arguably caused the whole problem: https://www.loc.gov/law/help/statutes-at-large/24th-congress/Session 2/c24s2ch3.pdf You have to love that Congress both gave simple specifications AND assumed that whatever the law said it said unless it was overridden... vs. today's https://www.congress.gov/105/plaws/publ124/PLAW-105publ124.pdf
It happened occasionally. In fact the 1870 gold dollar dies originally sent to San Francisco also lacked the mintmark. And I believe it was the gold dollars that had 2,000 pieces struck with no mintmark before it was noticed. That is my understanding as well. Documentation exists that does show that a full set of all denominations was struck for inclusion in the cornerstone. All of the coins show official mintage records for circulation except the half dime, quarter, silver dollar, and three dollar gold, so apparently they were only struck for inclusion in the cornerstone. But nine 70 S silver dollars are known, why so many? I suspect several of each coin were struck so the best of each could be selected for the cornerstone. (Same reason I believe for striking 8 1804 dollars when only 4 diplomatic sets were made. And originally it was just going to be two sets. The decision for the other two came a little later.) If so that could explain the extra 3 dollar and the half dime, they were pieces not selected. Which always brings up the question "Is there a 70 S quarter out there somewhere?"
I think the 70-s dollars were struck and passed out to various dignitaries or other executives that’s why there’s so many. They didn’t do that with the rest of the denominations. They found a half dime in the 70s I can only hope a quarter will be discovered the. $3 is rough. But unique
