More Pennies

[InforaPenny]

Freeman's survey included 433 1882-H pennies, none from the known 11+N 1882 no-H die pairing. In my own reference collection I have another 65 1882-H pennies, same story...

Best Regards,

InforaPenny

[Rob]

I was thinking more along the lines of both reverses being N, so what would be useful is a Heaton die with a developing flaw that can also be seen on the no H reverse. It may be a repaired die, but the important thing would be to see a trace of filled die as opposed to rubbed down letter.

Filled dies have characteristics which you would not be able to replicate with filing arising from the method used to repair them. When they filled dies it appears that they packed metal into the hole as tightly as possible and hammered it into the hole to compact it as much as possible, probably while the die was heated to let shrinkage make it tighter. This sometimes leaves a small ridge/depression at the junction of die and inserted metal. This would not occur with a filed down letter, which would surely be done post-mint.

[Prax]

After the contract with Heatons was completed, the dies presumably returned to Tower Hill where they were destroyed. However, if there was a requirement for a small quantity of pennies at the end of the year, then the logical way forward would be to take a Heaton die and fill the H in. Ideally it would be possible to check out the accepted 1882 no H for a filled die under an electron microscope as you would be looking for a slight perturbation in the field where the H should be. If the die was perfectly filled and polished down level with the field, then even this might not show.

Unfortunately Hocking doesn't list any items for 1882 or 1882H on the penny front in the RM museum, so this is not an option.

Does anyone know where the good no H pennies are? Better still, are they on good terms with any current owner?

Another line of enquiry would be to do a census of 1882H dies and see if any match the known no H dies.

Here is the second best no H that I know of https://www.spink.com/lot-description.aspx?id=320001053

[Rob]

Obverse 11 was used at Tower Hill in 1881 and 1883, so would presumably be also used in 1882.

Obverse 12 was used at Tower Hill in 1883, so there is no reason why it would not be used in 1882 if required as it was certainly in existence by then as it was used at Heaton that year.

Obverse 11 was used at Heatons in 1881 and 1882, so do we see any evidence of suspect 1882 11+N coins where the H may have been removed? As we must surely be looking at a single die pair for Tower Hill struck 11+N, it is likely that all coins would show or not show any definitive evidence.

Obverse 9 started out as the main Tower die in 1881, and the presumably rare 9+M Heaton coins used a residual die or dies(?) when production ceased at Tower Hill for the refurbishment. What happened to obverse 10 in 1881?

Reverse N presumably appeared later in 1882 as there are a good number of 1882H with rev.N.

If die manufacture was retained at Tower Hill which can be assumed, it is likely that they would have struck a few coins with the new reverse N prior to sending them to Heaton. These could use either obverse 11 or quite probably 12 given it was already in use at Heaton. Production didn't stop in 1882 at Tower Hill because they continued to strike silver there, so die manufacture is unlikely to have been significantly affected.

The question then arises whether any 1882 pennies from Tower Hill were trials, or a genuine production run. A few trials would likely be retained at the mint and so you would expect the survivors to be predominantly high grade. A proper production run for circulation would give rise to survivors in varying grades comparable to any other die combination. Does anyone have figures giving a rough estimate of the surviving numbers of these various die combinations and do these broadly agree with the data for 11+N no H pennies? Using theoretical survival rates based on known populations vs production totals, what output level does the number of 1882 Tower coins represent?

This is problem that will probably rumble on for eternity unless we can find documentary evidence that pennies were struck at Tower Hill in 1882. We struggle to deduce anything from the known die use to answer the question.

[VickySilver]

Yes indeed, I concur and thanks Rob for an eloquent assessment there. Prax, did you see the Spink America 1882 last year and was it the one featured in an SNC article 20 or so years ago. The Spink America coins were particularly nice and MUCH better than their lousy pictures or grades represented. I was not prepared to go above 20k pounds for the coin but did settle for an upgrade of my 1869, which again was FAR better than the pictures in guide.

I would certainly like to see a finer 1882!

[Mr T]

Freeman's survey included 433 1882-H pennies, none from the known 11+N 1882 no-H die pairing. In my own reference collection I have another 65 1882-H pennies, same story...

Best Regards,

InforaPenny

Where can Freeman's survey results be found?

Obverse 11 was used at Tower Hill in 1881 and 1883, so would presumably be also used in 1882.

Obverse 12 was used at Tower Hill in 1883, so there is no reason why it would not be used in 1882 if required as it was certainly in existence by then as it was used at Heaton that year.

Obverse 11 was used at Heatons in 1881 and 1882, so do we see any evidence of suspect 1882 11+N coins where the H may have been removed? As we must surely be looking at a single die pair for Tower Hill struck 11+N, it is likely that all coins would show or not show any definitive evidence.

Obverse 9 started out as the main Tower die in 1881, and the presumably rare 9+M Heaton coins used a residual die or dies(?) when production ceased at Tower Hill for the refurbishment. What happened to obverse 10 in 1881?

Reverse N presumably appeared later in 1882 as there are a good number of 1882H with rev.N.

If die manufacture was retained at Tower Hill which can be assumed, it is likely that they would have struck a few coins with the new reverse N prior to sending them to Heaton. These could use either obverse 11 or quite probably 12 given it was already in use at Heaton. Production didn't stop in 1882 at Tower Hill because they continued to strike silver there, so die manufacture is unlikely to have been significantly affected.

The question then arises whether any 1882 pennies from Tower Hill were trials, or a genuine production run. A few trials would likely be retained at the mint and so you would expect the survivors to be predominantly high grade. A proper production run for circulation would give rise to survivors in varying grades comparable to any other die combination. Does anyone have figures giving a rough estimate of the surviving numbers of these various die combinations and do these broadly agree with the data for 11+N no H pennies? Using theoretical survival rates based on known populations vs production totals, what output level does the number of 1882 Tower coins represent?

This is problem that will probably rumble on for eternity unless we can find documentary evidence that pennies were struck at Tower Hill in 1882. We struggle to deduce anything from the known die use to answer the question.

I think what you've said about die production is correct - the mint would likely have wanted to test die N in a more substantial way than the handful of

proofs of the previous year: evidently the new reverse N die was paired an older obverse 11 die (assuming one pair) for this small test run.

Whether it was a trial or production run is a bit hazy - it seems likely that it was a trial of sorts but the end result was perfectly acceptable coins that

could be released into circulation? Why let that work go to waste?

Was the H added to each die individually?

As for estimates - Freeman found no London pennies in

As for estimates, Freeman found no 11+N coin

As for estimates, Freeman found no 11+N coins from 433 1882-dated pennies; InforaPenny found none in 65 1882-dated pennies - we can estimate

an upper bound on the number of 11+N coins: they can occur at most once every 499 1882-dated coins which equates to 0.2% of 7,526,400 or ~15,000 coins.

Also, what is the story with the 1881 9+M? I see there is a question mark after it in Freeman.

[InforaPenny]

Mr T,

Freeman's survey results are published in his first book The Victorian Bronze Penny (1860-1901). The was privately published by Freeman in 1964 (and again in 1966 as a second edition, which was essentially the same). The survey covered some 50,000 circulated Victorian bronze pennies, of which 15,653 were bun pennies with readable dates. These were mostly acquired via an arrangement where Freeman went through coins collected by a Scottish bus company. This helped insure that they were a fairly random sample of coins that were in circulation before the great interest in pre-decimal pennies that started with decimalization. This is by far the largest survey conducted that I know of, and can never be repeated. This became the basis for Freeman's rarity ratings in his later books. These slim books with only about 38 pages, are scarce today. You might be able to find a copy in a library.

Best Regards,

InforaPenny

[Bernie]

The reason for the question mark for 1881 9+M was because the only one recorded at that time was very worn and it was at that time not known whether there was or was not originally an "H" below the date. It was probably known at that time that a proof example 9+M existed without an "H" below the date. For those readers who may not know... The currency 9+M does in fact have an "H" below the date.

The 1882 pennies without "H" were probably struck to test the dies in 1881.

[Mr T]

Mr T,

Freeman's survey results are published in his first book The Victorian Bronze Penny (1860-1901). The was privately published by Freeman in 1964 (and again in 1966 as a second edition, which was essentially the same). The survey covered some 50,000 circulated Victorian bronze pennies, of which 15,653 were bun pennies with readable dates. These were mostly acquired via an arrangement where Freeman went through coins collected by a Scottish bus company. This helped insure that they were a fairly random sample of coins that were in circulation before the great interest in pre-decimal pennies that started with decimalization. This is by far the largest survey conducted that I know of, and can never be repeated. This became the basis for Freeman's rarity ratings in his later books. These slim books with only about 38 pages, are scarce today. You might be able to find a copy in a library.

Best Regards,

InforaPenny

Ah thanks. Too bad that information didn't make it into his later publications - I always thought number surviving was an inferior metric to frequency.

The reason for the question mark for 1881 9+M was because the only one recorded at that time was very worn and it was at that time not known whether there was or was not originally an "H" below the date. It was probably known at that time that a proof example 9+M existed without an "H" below the date. For those readers who may not know... The currency 9+M does in fact have an "H" below the date.

The 1882 pennies without "H" were probably struck to test the dies in 1881.

Yes okay - I see some more have since been discovered now.

[MACKSILKY.]

Very interesting, been looking at a few 1882 H pennies of mine and come across this one. The H below the date appears to be unbarred. Can anyone tell me if they are common?

[PWA 1967]

Yes the unbarred ones for 1882 are common

[Prax]

Yes fairly common

[MACKSILKY.]

Cheers boy's for the info.

[Prax]

Haha yeah, that'll be the day..

Well a good price for a b****y difficult year, a job well done I'd say

In case you are still looking

http://www.ebay.com/itm/BRITISH-Gr-Britain-Edward-VII-King-1901-1910-1904-AE-Penny-PCGS-MS64RB-London-/171689860786?pt=LH_DefaultDomain_0&hash=item27f9835eb2

I am sure you can try $160-180 which should be reasonable

Edited May 15, 2015 by Prax

[Nordle11]

+1

[Mr T]

Freeman's survey results are published in his first book The Victorian Bronze Penny (1860-1901). The was privately published by Freeman in 1964 (and again in 1966 as a second edition, which was essentially the same). The survey covered some 50,000 circulated Victorian bronze pennies, of which 15,653 were bun pennies with readable dates. These were mostly acquired via an arrangement where Freeman went through coins collected by a Scottish bus company. This helped insure that they were a fairly random sample of coins that were in circulation before the great interest in pre-decimal pennies that started with decimalization. This is by far the largest survey conducted that I know of, and can never be repeated.

So besides Freeman and V.R. Court there aren't any other penny surveys of interest?

[hazelman]

You should get hold of Gouby's books The British bronze penny 1860 to 1970 available at Michael Coins the Author

[Mr T]

Already got them but I'm quite interested in the raw numbers leading to the rarity ratings.

[Peter]

Freeman's survey results are published in his first book The Victorian Bronze Penny (1860-1901). The was privately published by Freeman in 1964 (and again in 1966 as a second edition, which was essentially the same). The survey covered some 50,000 circulated Victorian bronze pennies, of which 15,653 were bun pennies with readable dates. These were mostly acquired via an arrangement where Freeman went through coins collected by a Scottish bus company. This helped insure that they were a fairly random sample of coins that were in circulation before the great interest in pre-decimal pennies that started with decimalization. This is by far the largest survey conducted that I know of, and can never be repeated.

So besides Freeman and V.R. Court there aren't any other penny surveys of interest?

Many in Coin monthlies.

Not just 1ds

I've retained 100's

[PWA 1967]

Been focusing on the coppers over the last few months i like the look of them and the interesting varieties.

One that was a struggle in a decent grade was the 1834.

Anyway happy with the one i have and wont be looking for a better one.

Its c.g.s. 31743.

[Paulus]

PWA's coin:

[Peter]

The tone is just perfect.

A coin like that keeps me ....well just floats my 70ft canal boat.

[Prax]

PWA's coin:

nyc

[Prax]

Freeman's survey results are published in his first book The Victorian Bronze Penny (1860-1901). The was privately published by Freeman in 1964 (and again in 1966 as a second edition, which was essentially the same). The survey covered some 50,000 circulated Victorian bronze pennies, of which 15,653 were bun pennies with readable dates. These were mostly acquired via an arrangement where Freeman went through coins collected by a Scottish bus company. This helped insure that they were a fairly random sample of coins that were in circulation before the great interest in pre-decimal pennies that started with decimalization. This is by far the largest survey conducted that I know of, and can never be repeated.

So besides Freeman and V.R. Court there aren't any other penny surveys of interest?

Mr T let's start our own

Me thinks it would be good to start a headcount on some of the rarer variants and as most of the 'Big Fish' are on this forum it might be good to get started here.

I am starting with the scarcer 1874 (8+G and 8+H) and 1874 H (F69 and F76) pennies

Gouby's specialised bronze book provides the latest count on the pennies where he states that there are 7 known F76s and 9 known F69s (in all grades?)

I am pretty sure there are a few more, because of the

F69s I have 5 - 1 in Fine and 2 in Fair and 2 in good grade

F76 I have 3 - 1 in GF 1 in Fair and 1 Poor

Apart from this I have seen Gary Schindler sell 2 or 3 F69s on ebay a couple of years back. So as far as the F69s go I am of the opinion there are around 20 F69s and about 12 F76s. The obverse 8 1874 pennies are scarce in XF+ grade so let us limit the discussion on these to just XF and above.

Unfortunately though I have about 30 obverse 8 pennies none of those are in grades over fine.

Would like to hear from the other Bronze Boys about their thoughts on all 4 1874s once done I would like to start a similar rant on the 1861 scare variants.

Edited May 24, 2015 by Prax

[PWA 1967]

Not much from me.

F69 6+l ex-tony crocker sale

F78 8+H low grade off ebay.

The F76 i dont have ,although i might get one now why prax has three.