Search in eAuction


CNG Bidding Platform

Information

Products and Services


Use Old Home Page

eAuction
Keystone Auction 8

Lot nuber 248

CANADA, Blacksmith tokens – Daniel & Benjamin True types. CU Token (27mm, 4.70 g, 10h). Uncertain mint in New York or Lower Canada. Struck circa 1835.


Keystone Auction 8
Lot: 248.
 Estimated: $ 100

Canadian Blacksmith & Related Tokens from the RH Collection, Copper

Sold For $ 100. This amount does not include the buyer’s fee.

Go to Live

CANADA, Blacksmith tokens – Daniel & Benjamin True types. CU Token (27mm, 4.70 g, 10h). Uncertain mint in New York or Lower Canada. Struck circa 1835. Laureate and cuirassed bust of George III right; crude toothed border and diagnostic die break / Britannia seated right on globe, holding olive branch and scepter; Union shield to left; crude toothed border. Wood, Blacksmith 23; Breton –; Charlton BL-40A1. Brown surfaces. Fine.

From the RH Collection, purchased from Chesapeake Bay Rare Coins, November 2014.

The Charlton guide simply notes that Daniel and Benjamin True of Troy, New York produced numerous tokens in the U.S. “Hard Times” series, and that around 1835 they began making low weight blacksmith tokens. This is at the very least partially incorrect. Lyman Low incorrectly placed the pair at Troy, New York, but they were actually residents of Albany. Julia Casey notes that there was a Rising Sun Tavern at the corner of South Pearl and Beaver streets in Albany from 1830-1835, located near the Trues’ workshop on Beaver. Based on the proximity of the two establishments, she suggests that Trues engraved not only the Rising Sun die, but the other blacksmith dies linked to it.

While they may have simply been producing the tokens in Albany for shipment to Canada, Casey suggests another interesting alternative that could also explain other rare Hard Times token-related blacksmiths: engraver and part-time counterfeiter Edward Huselman. Probably born in Europe, Huselman is known to have worked in Attleboro, Massachusetts from 1836 to 1836, with R.W. Robinson and H.M. & E.I. Richards. In 1837, he opened his own engraving shop in New York City. A few years later, on 10 August 1840, Huselman was indicted for counterfeiting banknotes and fled to Canada.

Casey proposes that Huselman met with Benjamin True in Albany while fleeing north, and there acquired a number of dies from him. The traditional George III types (BL-40; Wood 23) may have already been in production in Lower Canada at this time, but later mules would have been produced by Huselman.

For this discussion, see: Casey, Julia. “Huselman, the Counterfeiter: the Dies of Benjamin True in the Canadian Blacksmith Token Series,” The Colonial Newsletter vol. 55, no. 2 (August 2015)

Closing Date and Time: 23 August 2022 at 11:22:20 ET.



Winning bids are subject to a 22.5% buyer's fee for bids placed on this website, 25% for all others.