Chapter 14 of 18 · 3983 words · ~20 min read

Part 14

III. Christian Gobrecht was appointed December 21, 1840, to fill the vacancy made by the death of Kneass. He was born in Hanover, York Co., Pa., December 23, 1785. In 1811 he went to Philadelphia, and became an engraver of bank notes, seals, calico printers’ rolls, bookbinders’ dies, etc. In 1836 he received an appointment as assistant to Mr. Kneass at the Mint, in which capacity he executed some important work. Among other similar performances he was highly commended for his Franklin Institute Medal.

Christian Gobrecht continued in office until his death, July 23, 1844.

IV. James B. Longacre was born August 11, 1794, in Delaware Co., Pa. He served an apprenticeship as a line engraver with George Murray, Philadelphia, and did some high class plate-work before he was free, in 1819. He was one of the originators of the _National Portrait Gallery of Distinguished Americans_, the first volume of which appeared in 1834. Longacre drew from life and engraved many of the portraits entire.

Like his predecessors, he died in office—January 1, 1869. During his term Mr. Longacre was variously assisted by P. F. Cross, William Barber, Anthony C. Paquet, and William H. Key. Cross was born in Sheffield, England, served several years in the Mint here, and died in 1856. He engraved the obverse of the Ingraham medal. Paquet was born in Hamburg, 1814, emigrated 1848, served as assistant 1857 to 1864, died, 1882. He engraved the medals of Grant, Johnson, Buchanan, Everett, and the Life Saving Medals, with some others. Key is a native of Brooklyn, was appointed an assistant, 1864, and is still in the service. He executed the Kane Expedition and Archbishop Wood Medals. The changes and additions during the Longacre term were numerous and important, both as to alloys and denominations. The pattern pieces also record various experiments in the art of coining.

V. William Barber, fifth Engraver of the Mint, was born in London, May 2, 1807. He learned his profession from his father, John Barber, and was employed on silver-plate work, after his emigration to this country.

He resided in Boston ten years, and was variously employed in his line of work. His skill in this way came to the knowledge of Mr. Longacre, then Engraver of the Mint, and he secured his services as an assistant in 1865.

In January, 1869, upon the death of Mr. Longacre, he was appointed as his successor, and continued in that position for the remainder of his life. His death, which resulted from severe chills, brought on by bathing at the seashore, occurred in Philadelphia, August 31, 1879.

Besides much original work on pattern coins, he also produced over forty medals, public and private. The work on all of them was creditable, but we may specify those of Agassiz, Rittenhouse, and Henry, as very superior specimens of art. Mr. Barber was assisted by Mr. William H. Key, Mr. Charles E. Barber, and Mr. George T. Morgan.

VI. Charles E. Barber, sixth Engraver, is a son of the preceding, and was born in London in 1840. He was appointed an assistant in 1869, and became the official head by promotion in 1880, to fill the vacancy caused by his father’s death. The appointment was not unmerited. One of Mr. Barber’s latest cards to the public is the new five-cent piece—a successful venture in very low relief. But his handiwork is more or less visible in all the principal medals executed since 1869. Since his appointment as Chief Engraver, the work of his department has been enormously increased by the number of medal dies demanded for the War Department and from other Government sources. Mr. Barber’s best work is seen in the medals of Presidents Garfield, Arthur, Indian Peace, Army Marksmanship, and Great Seal. He is particularly happy in “catching a likeness.” The head of Superintendent Snowden is a rare specimen of medallic portraiture.[22]

Messrs. Key and Morgan are the Engraver’s assistants. The former has already received notice; the latter, Mr. George T. Morgan, was born in Birmingham, England, in 1845; he studied at the Art School there, and won a National Scholarship at the South Kensington, where he was a student two years. He is best known to the country by the so-called “Bland dollar,” which is his design and execution.

We have reason to congratulate both the Government and the people that the engraving service is well and judiciously furnished.

BENJAMIN RUSH,

An eminent physician and philanthropist, was born near Philadelphia, December 24, 1745; he graduated from Princeton College in 1760; he afterwards studied medicine in Edinburgh, London, and Paris; returning to this country, he was elected Professor of Chemistry in the Medical College of Philadelphia in 1769. In 1776 he was elected to the Continental Congress, and was one of the signers of the Declaration of Independence in the same year; he was afterwards appointed Surgeon-General of Revolutionary Army, and voted for the adoption of the Constitution of the United States in 1787. Dr. Rush was a popular lecturer, and eminently qualified as a teacher of medicine. When the yellow fever scourged the City, and the public buildings were closed in 1799 and 1800, he was very successful in his treatment of the victims of that epidemic. It is said that he visited and prescribed for one hundred patients in a single day. He was treasurer of the first United States Mint during the last fourteen years of his life. Dr. Rush died in Philadelphia in April, 1813. Among his nine children was Richard Rush, the statesman.

NOTE.—Dr. Rush was the author of the first pamphlet on temperance published in this country, showing the injurious effects of alcoholic drinks on the human system, and is justly regarded as the father of the temperance movement, the Centennial of which has lately been celebrated throughout the United States, September, 1885.

CASHIER.

MARK H. COBB, the Cashier of the Mint from 1871 until the present time (1885), was born in Colebrook, Connecticut, in 1828. In 1861, Hon. Simon Cameron, then Secretary of War, appointed him Chief Clerk in the War Department, he having previously been his private secretary. After Mr. Cameron’s resignation as Secretary, Mr. Cobb, at the solicitation of the late Col. John W. Forney, accepted the position of Enrolling Clerk of the United States Senate in 1862. In 1871 he was appointed to the responsible position of Cashier in the United States Mint.

ALBION COX, first assayer of the Mint was appointed April 4, 1794. His commission, signed by Washington, until recently, hung upon the walls of the assay office. But little is known of Mr. Cox, save that he was an Englishman by birth, and a good officer, as appears from the following report to the Secretary of the Treasury made by Director Boudinot, under date, December 3, 1795. He says: “The sudden and unexpected death of the assayer, Mr. Albion Cox, on Fryday last by an apoplectic fit, deprived the Mint of an intelligent officer, essentially necessary to the future progress in the coinage of the precious metals. Until this officer is replaced, the business at the Mint must be confined to striking cents only.”

He therefore held office about a year and eight months.

Joseph Richardson, second assayer, was appointed December 12, 1795. He belonged to an old Quaker family distinguished for ability and character. Mr. Richardson fulfilled the duties of his office with credit and honor. He died in March, 1831. A water color portrait of him, dressed in plain Quaker garb, hangs in the assayers’ room. He held office over thirty-five years.

John Richardson, son of the preceding, was appointed assayer March 31, 1831. Finding the office not congenial with his tastes, and so subjecting him to undue responsibilities, he resigned April, 1832, holding office only a little over a year.

CURATOR.

R. A. MCCLURE, a gentleman skilled in the science of numismatics, was appointed Assistant Curator of the Coin Cabinet in 1868, and, upon the death of the Assayer and Chief Curator in 1881, the responsibilities of the Curatorship fell upon Mr. McClure.

STANDARD WEIGHTS.

The earliest series of standard weights now known, are two sets discovered by Mr. Layard in the ruins of Nineveh. They are now in the British Museum. William the Conqueror decreed the continuance, as the legal standard, of the pound in use by the Saxons. This and other standards of weight and measure were removed by the King from the City of Winchester to the Exchequer at Westminster, and placed in a consecrated building in charge of his chamberlains. The place of deposit is said to have been the crypt chapel of Edward the Confessor, in Westminster Abbey. In 1866 the office of Exchequer was abolished, and the Standards Department of the Board of Trade was established in London, assuming charge of the standards—an arrangement still in force.

The old Saxon pound was the earliest standard of England. It was identical in weight with the old apothecaries’ pound of Germany, and equal to 5,400 of our later Troy grains. The pound sterling was determined from this weight in silver. Henry III., in 1266, decreed the following standards: The sterling, or penny, to weigh equal to thirty-two wheat corns, taken from the middle of the ear; twenty pence, one ounce; twelve ounces, one pound; eight pounds, one gallon of wine, which is the eighth part of a quarter. The idea of the grain was borrowed by the English from the French, and the Black Prince brought back with him from France the pound Troye, which was derived from the commercial town of that name. The use of the Troy standard was adopted by the druggists and jewelers, on account of its convenient reduction into grains.

The pound avoirdupois, weighing 7,000 grains Troy, (Fr. _Avoir-du-poids_, “to have weight”), first appears in use during the reign of Edward III., and it, as well as the Troy pound, has been employed without change ever since. In the year 1834 the English standards of weight and measure, consisting of a yard and pound Troy of brass, were destroyed by fire at the burning of the Houses of Parliament. A few years later a commission of scientific men was appointed to determine upon the restoration of the standards. This resulted in a succession of difficult problems resultant upon the oxidation to a greater or less extent of duplicates of the standard still existing, as also of the variation of the cubic inch of water, as in use in different lands. A cubic inch of distilled water, weighed in air against brass weights, at a temperature of 62 degrees Fahr., the barometer being at 30 inches, had been determined by scientific men to be equal to 252.458 grains, of which the standard Troy pound contained 5,760.

As the unit of length was also lost, a series of experiments was made in the vibration of a pendulum in a vacuum, marking seconds of mean time in the latitude of London at the level of the sea. These deductions, however, failed to be satisfactory, and the commission was compelled to fall back upon the best preserved of the duplicate standards existent. The Imperial Standard Pound is declared to be the true weight of an avoirdupois pound in a vacuum. It is a curious fact that the Imperial standards of platinum (which metal is not subject to oxidation), although balancing brass weights in a vacuum, weigh in air more than one-half a grain heavier than the latter. This is due to their greater displacement of space.

The unit of weight in the United States is a Troy pound weight obtained from England, a duplicate of the original standard fixed by the commission of 1758, and reasserted by the commission of 1838. It is a bronze weight of 5,760 grains Troy. It is kept in a strong safe at the United States Mint, in Philadelphia. The President appoints an assay commission, whose members meet at Philadelphia annually, upon the second Wednesday in February, open the safe, and compare the copies, or the working weights, with the original upon the most delicately poised balances. Working standards of weights and measures are supplied by the Secretary of State to the State governments, which in turn supply them to the sealers of weights and measures of the various countries, who must compare with the State standard once a year.

[Illustration: TROY STANDARD POUND WEIGHT.

Fac-simile, exact size.]

All of the scales and delicate test instruments in use by the government, not only in Philadelphia Mint, but at the several branch mints, are manufactured in this country, and as examples of wonderful mechanical machines of minute accuracy they lead the world. Some of them are the work of Mr. Henry Troemner, of Philadelphia, to whom, it is proper to say, the writer is largely indebted for the facts given in this article. Mr. Troemner, in the capacity of government expert, makes frequent visits to the most distant points in the Union for the verification of national standards. The Treasury Department made an especial request of him to exhibit at the New Orleans Exposition, a line of his fine balances.

EXTRACT FROM CONSTITUTION OF THE UNITED STATES.

ARTICLE I., Sect. 8. The Congress shall have power ... to coin money, regulate the value thereof and of foreign coins, and fix the standard of weights and measures, ... to provide for the punishment of counterfeiting the securities and current coin of the United States.

ARTICLE I. Sect. 2. No State shall ... coin money, emit bills of credit, make anything but gold and silver coin a tender in payment of debts, ...

Coinage, fiscal year 1887.

---------------+------------+--------------- Description. | Pieces. | Value. ---------------+------------+--------------- Gold | 3,724,720 | $22,393,279.00 Silver | 44,231,288 | 34,366,483.75 Minor Coins | 50,166,509 | 943,650.65 ---------------+------------+--------------- Total | 98,122,517 | $57,703,413.40 ---------------+------------+----------------

Total number of Coinage Dies made during the year 1887.

Gold coinage 120 Silver coinage 359 Minor coinage 684 Proof coinage 27

Bullion for the Silver Dollar Coinage, 1887.

## Partings, bar charges and fractions | 131,783.20 | 114,982.36

+---------------+---------------- Total delivered on purchases | 29,433,342.27 | $25,988,620.46 Balance on hand July 1, 1886 | 3,258,495.66 | 2,960,969.02 +---------------+---------------- Available for coinage of silver | | dollars during the fiscal year 1887 | 32,691,837.93 | $28,949,589.48 --------------------------------------+---------------+----------------

Value of the Gold and Silver (not including re-deposits) received at the Mints and Assay Offices during the fiscal years 1880-1887.

--------+------------+------------+------------- Fiscal | | | years. | Gold. | Silver. | Total. --------+------------+------------+------------- 1880 |$ 98,835,096| $34,640,522| $133,475,618 1881 | 130,833,102| 30,791,146| 161,624,248 1882 | 66,756,652| 33,720,491| 100,477,143 1883 | 46,347,106| 36,869,834| 83,216,940 1884 | 46,326,678| 36,520,290| 82,846,968 1885 | 52,894,075| 36,789,774| 89,683,849 1886 | 44,909,749| 35,494,183| 80,403,932 1887 | 68,223,072| 47,756,918| 115,979,990 --------+------------+------------+-------------

Silver Coins of the United States.

----------------+-------+-------+---------------+--------+--------------- |Coinage| | Amount coined |Standard|Amount for Denominations. | com- |Coinage| to June 30, | weight,| which a |menced.|ceased.| 1884. | grains.|legal tender. ----------------+-------+-------+---------------+--------+--------------- Standard dollars| 1878 | |$175,355,829.00| 412.5 | Unlimited. Trade dollars | 1873 | 1878 | 35,959,360.00| 420. | Not a legal | | | | | tender. Dollars | 1793 | 1873 | 8,045,838.00| 412.5 | Unlimited. Half dollars | 1793 | | 122,765,735.00| 192.9 | Ten dollars. Quarter dollars | 1796 | | 38,495,918.75| 96.45| Ten dollars. Twenty cents | 1875 | 1878 | 271,000.00| 77.16| Five dollars. Dimes | 1796 | | 18,293,172.50| 38.58| Ten dollars. Half dimes | 1793 | 1873 | 4,906,946.90| 19.29| Five dollars. Three cents | 1851 | 1873 | 1,281,850.20| 11.52| Five dollars. ----------------+-------+-------+---------------+--------+---------------

[Illustration: FAC-SIMILE REPRODUCTIONS OF CONTINENTAL CURRENCY.]

Trade-Dollars Coined, Exported, Imported, Melted, and Redeemed (Act of March 3, 1887).

Coined: Mint at Philadelphia $5,107,024 Mint at San Francisco 26,647,000 Mint at Carson 4,211,400 ----------- $35,965,924 Exported 28,778,862 Imported 1,706,020 ----------- Net export 27,072,842 ----------- 8,893,082 Melted:

{ Previous to Redemption { Act $915,346 As bullion. { Excluded from { redemption (mutilated { pieces, etc.) 4,113 ---------- 919,459 { Mint at Philadelphia 3,427,369 { Mint at San Francisco 764,263 Redeemed. { Mint at New Orleans 1,871 { Assay office at New York 3,495,533 ---------- Total redeemed 7,689,036 --------- Total melted 8,608,495 ---------

Not accounted for and not presented for redemption; employed in the arts; specimen pieces in the hands of coin collectors, carried out by emigrants, and in miscellaneous deposits of coin remelted at mints, etc. $284,587

GROSS PROFITS ON SILVER COINAGE IN 1887.

The seignorage or immediate gross profit on the coinage of silver dollars—that is, the difference between the cost of the bullion and the nominal value of the coins—during the fiscal year 1887, was $7,923,558.61.

The seignorage on subsidiary coin manufactured during the year was $31,704.94, of which $1,130.65 was gained from the recoinage of old subsidiary coins in the Treasury.

The total seignorage on the silver coinage during the fiscal year was $7,955,263.55.

As stated in last fiscal report, the balance of silver profits remaining in the coinage mints on the 1st July, 1886, amounted to $553,201.44.

Adding to this the seignorage of the year, the total gross silver profits to be accounted for by the mints is $8,508,464.99.

Of this there was paid for expenses of distributing silver coin $35,059.03, and reimbursed for wastage and loss on sale of sweeps $20,294.88.

The seignorage on the coinage of silver at the mints of the United States from July 1, 1878, to the close of the fiscal year ended June 30, 1887, has amounted to $39,057,566.90.

Tabulated Statement of Expenditures of the Mint at Philadelphia, for the Fiscal Year ended June 30, 1887.

Value of the Foreign Gold Coins Deposited at the United States Assay Office at New York during the Year ended June 30, 1887.

----------------------+---------------+-----------------+--------------- | Denominations | Total of each | Total by Countries of Coinage. | of coin. | denomination of | countries of | | coin. | coinage. ----------------------+---------------+-----------------+--------------- Costa Rica | Mixed | 257.56 | $257.56 France | 20 francs | 1,219,351.02 | 1,219,351.02 Germany | 20 marks | 179,121.67 | 179,121.67 Great Britain | Sovereigns | 1,018,036.21 | 1,018,036.21 Japan | Yens | 18,608.37 | 18,608.37 Mexico | 20 pesos | 388,668.88 | ” | 10 pesos | 1,341.64 | ” | Doubloons | 1,178.60 | 391,189.12 Russia | 5 roubles | 155,237.39 | ” | Roubles | 2,596.80 | ” | ½ imperials | 577,223.34 | 735,057.53 Peru | 20 soles | 999.82 | 999.82 Spain | Doubloons | 3,101,388.08 | ” | Isabellines | 98,151.58 | ” | 25 pesetas | 957,276.17 | ” | Mixed | 179,863.62 | 4,336,679.45 U. S. Colombia | Cinco pesos | 709.76 | 709.76 | +-----------------+--------------- Total | | $7,900,010.51 | $7,900,010.51 ----------------------+---------------+-----------------+---------------

The total value of both gold and silver deposited and purchased at the mints of the United States during the fiscal year 1887, not including redeposits, was $115,979,991.62, and including redeposits, $131,635,811.34.

The value of the gold and silver received at the mints and assay offices during the fiscal year 1887, was greater than any previous year since 1881.

IMPROVEMENTS MADE AT THE PHILADELPHIA MINT IN 1887, UNDER THE SUPERVISION OF HON. DANIEL M. FOX.

Impairment of the foundation of the old engine, together with the requirement of increased power, at the mint at Philadelphia led to a special appropriation by Act of Congress of $54,639.20, in accordance with specifications for the renewal of the steam motive plant and for its transfer from the centre of the building to space newly provided near the northern outer wall. The work, undertaken in July, was, by extraordinary exertions on the part of all engaged, completed early in September, with an interruption of less than two months to the regular course of complete operations. Two new 150-horse-power duplex steam-engines and one of 50-horse-power have been erected in the north basement, along with three tubular boilers, coal bunkers, etc.

By this important improvement in plant valuable space has been secured in the centre basement and ground floor for vaults and other necessities.

The number of assays made during the year was some 66,000, of which 48,000 were silver and 18,000 gold.

The melter and refiner of the mint operated upon a larger quantity of bullion than in any previous year in the history of the institution. The operations by this officer may be stated as follows:

Ounces. Gold deposits 409,326 Silver deposits 44,239,881 Parted and refined 721,765

As this bullion is handled more than sixteen times in the processes of melting and preparation for coinage or for manufacture of fine bars, the combined operations represent a single handling of nearly 25,000 tons.

The operations of the coiner’s department may be stated as follows:

Ounces. Gold 13,574 Silver 42,924,485 Minor coinage metal 5,588,897 ---------- Total 48,526,956

The total coinage was $23,277,600.80, the total number of pieces being 81,532,391.

In addition to the coinage executed during the year, gold and silver bars were manufactured as follows:

Gold $58,188,953.66 Silver 6,481,611.25 -------------- Total $64,670,564.91

Gold and Silver Bullion in the Mints and Assay Offices July 1, 1887.

Total Metallic Stock in the United States July 1, 1887, Coin and Bullion included.

--------+--------------- | Value. --------+--------------- Gold | $654,520,335 Silver | 352,993,566 +--------------- Total |$1,007,513,901 --------+---------------

At the beginning of the fiscal year 1887 there was on hand at the mints at Philadelphia, New Orleans and San Francisco, silver bullion purchased for the silver dollar coinage amounting to $2,960,969.02. There was delivered at the mints on purchases of all kinds during the year, as above, 29,433,342.27 standard ounces, at a cost of $25,988,620.46, making the total amount of silver available during the fiscal year for the silver dollar coinage 32,691,837.93 standard ounces, costing $28,949,589.48.

The price paid by this Bureau on November 1, 1887, for silver purchases for the silver dollar coinage was $0.9580.80 per ounce fine.

The production of silver, notwithstanding the large depreciation in the market value of that metal, has steadily increased from $115,000,000 in 1883 to $130,000,000 in 1886. The production of the world for the calendar years 1883, 1884, 1885 and 1886 is exhibited in the following table:

World’s Production of Gold and Silver.

---------+-----------------------+------------------------ | Gold. | Silver. Calendar +----------+------------+----------+------------- Years. |Kilograms.| Value.[23] |Kilograms.| Value.[24] ---------+----------+------------+----------+------------- 1883 | 143,533 | $95,392,000| 2,769,197| $115,088,000 1884 | 153,017 | 101,694,000| 2,804,725| 116,564,000 1885 | 154,942 | 102,975,000| 3,062,009| 127,257,000 1886 | 147,097 | 97,761,000| 3,137,175| 130,383,000 ---------+----------+------------+----------+-------------

The United States still maintains first rank among the nations of the world as the largest producer of the precious metals, having produced during the calendar year 1886 gold and silver of the coining value of $86,000,000. Mexico retains second rank, with a production of $33,614,000, of which $33,000,000 was silver. Australia has a production of $27,647,000, of which $26,425,000 was gold. Russia is credited with a production of $21,046,000, of which $20,518,000 was gold.