Kind of a weird question: Were counting machines ever used to sort gold dollars?

[James_OldeTowne]

I think I am seeing counting machine damage on a particular example....

 

Thanks!

[RWB]

I do not recall ever seeing information about 19th century coin dispensing machines that handled gold dollars. The coins did not circulate for at least the last 15 years they were made, which was well before the primary era of automatic cashier machines. (Most were used in jewelry.) A very few machines were made that dispensed gold, but most, such as the Brandt Cashier, handled only 1-cent through 50-cents, and sometimes silver dollars. They were used to assemble weekly pay envelopes at factories. Anything greater than 99-cents was commonly paid in paper currency.

[BillJones]

If there ever were any counting machines for gold coins, only a fool would have used one. The problem is handling gold coins like that would invariably result in a loss of metal. With gold coins that would have been a disaster because the coin’s value was directly determined by its weight. If a gold coin was underweight, the receiver of such a piece had to right to reject it or accept it at a discount below its face value.

 

Here’s another way of putting it. In the 19th century one dishonest practice was to “sweat” gold coins. The procedure was to put a group of gold coins in a leather bag and shake them up. After this had been done for a while, the coins were removed and the bag was cut apart. Within the bag flecks of gold would be left which could be accumulated and ultimately sold as bullion. Putting gold coins through a counting machine would have resulted in the same thing.

 

In the 19th and early 20th century gold coins were counted by hand. The procedure was to “stack” coins in piles. Those who were doing the counting did not have to count the number of pieces in each pile. Each pile had the same height and therefore contained the same number of pieces. This was what the term “stacking” really met. It did not mean that high knees or the Indian cheekbones on the St. Gaudens $20 and Indian $2.50 and $5.00 caused the piles to fall over because the coins would not stack in neat piles.

 

[RWB]

… 19th century one dishonest practice was to “sweat” gold coins….

 

“Sweating” refers to placing the gold coin in nitric & hydrochloric acids (aqua regina) for a short time, then removing it. The coin would show little obvious change, but the acid would have dissolved a small amount of gold and copper. This was repeated with many gold coins, until the acid was saturated, then the gold was extracted from the liquid.

 

Shaking in a leather bag was one of many abrasive techniques used. Sliding on a leather covered board was easy to do. Bankers were aware of these techniques and on the lookout for altered gold coin.

 

[physics-fan3.14]

Great info, guys!

[Conder101]

Is it possible the gold dollar was accidently mixed in with other coins and run through a counting machine in error? I know in the 50's and 60's people would sometimes pass their "illegal" gold coins in vending machines which could get the coins mixed in with dines or nickels, or half dollars. Problem is there is no circulation coin used in vending machines similar in size to a gold dollar. The cent comes closest, and there were vending machies that took cents back then, but even those machines back then would have rejected a coin 4 mm too small.

[PerryHall]

Problem is there is no circulation coin used in vending machines similar in size to a gold dollar. The cent comes closest,

 

Actually, the gold dollar is closer to dime size than cent size.

[DaveG]

To add to what BillJones said, the Mint Annual Reports for the second half of the 19th century list the denominations and number of gold coins that were deposited for re-coining as "mutilitated and uncurrent".

 

Since a lot of the "old tenor" gold coins had already been turned in for re-coining between 1834 and 1861 (about $1.6 million at Philadelphia), I suspect most of the coins that were deposited were post-1833.

 

A substantial numbers of double eagles were re-coined. Given that they were only between 20 and 40 years old and didn't really circulate hand-to-hand, they were probably worn down to about XF - which isn't much wear at all in terms of how much weight they had lost.

 

Merchants and banks must have been pretty serious about accepting only full-weight gold coins!

[RWB]

Merchants, particularly those involved with international trade, viewed gold coins as an alternative form of bullion - nothing more. Bars were the first choice, with coins used only for small transactions or where bars were not available. Gold coins for export were valued strictly according to gold content, then discounted because they had to be melted, refined and assayed.

 

US Mints tried to keep full-value gold in circulation, thus, their active recoinage program.

 

Modern coin collectors have built a fantasy of how gold coins were used that does not match commercial reality. The real story is much more interesting.