[Volume XXV
CHICAGO BANKER
THE
28
The Confederate Half Dollar
and Cent
“Cupid, the Surgeon”
It is scarcely likely that Herman Lee Meader’s new work on Operations on the Heart will become a standard text-book in our medical schools. Instead, the fat cupid on the cover sewing up a broken heart doesn’t in the least resemble the drawings to be found in orthodox works on surgery. A look between the covers only confirms one’s suspicions; and a single glance betrays the fact that Mr. Meader (author of “Thro’ the Rye”) is again at his old tricks of laugh-making. He says that in all the world the only thing worth winning is a woman, and he goes laughingly on to coach his readers in the Ancient Art of Love-making.
“Cupid, the Surgeon.” By Herman Lee Meader; Philadelphia: Henry Altemus Co. Decorated cloth. (Price, $1.00.)
Pacific Northwest Banking Notes
Stanley Easton, manager of the Bunker Hill & Sullivan mine at Wardner, Idaho, which has produced 12 per cent of the total lead output of the United States in the last few years and paid dividends amounting to $10,515,000 since its development at the rate of $75,000 a month, announces that its capacity will be doubled soon, thus putting out 2,000 tons of ore every eight hours. The company will put in a mill, costing $80,000, thus increasing the dividend.
Volney D. Williamson, a Spokane capitalist, is having plans prepared for a seven story office building to cost $200,000 in Sprague Avenue near Washington Street. The Hutton building in the same block is also to be increased from a four story to a seven story building at a cost of $125,-000. The structure is 75 by 155 feet, and is occupied by the chamber of commerce and brokerage firms. The Williamson structure will occupy 50 by 155 feet adjoining the Plutton building.
First State Bank of White Bluffs, Wash., will open for business January 1st. Fred W. Peet, a Minnesota banker, and local capitalists are interested in the institution, which is the first in the district.
Boundary Investment & Trust Company, headed by Mayor Fripp, has taken over the British-American Trust Company at Grand Forks, B. C, and will begin business January
The Niles National
The stockholders of the First National of Niles, O., which closed its doors on September 3d, announced Monday their intention of organizing a new bank in Niles. They have purchased the building formerly occupied by the old bank and applied for a charter under the name of the Niles National. The capital stock will be $100,000, and C. P. Wilson will be made president and Robert L. McCorkle cashier. Other officers already interested are C. P. Wilson, W. A. Thomas, D. J. Finney. Dr. D. W. Strickland, P. E. McCormick, L. H. Young and F. E. Thomas.
V
The Saco and Biddeford Savings Bank
Melville H. Kell}־ has resigned his position as treasurer_of the Saco & Biddeford Savings Insertion, of Saco, Maine. W. T. Goodale has been elected to succeed him.■
V*
Bank Merger in Havana
It is announced that the National Bank of Cuba and the Bank of Havana will consolidate. The capital will not be increased, the former bank merely absorbing the latter.
V»
First National of Boothbay Harbor
The First National of Boothbay Harbor, Me., reports Watson M. Simpson assistant cashier.
The restruck coins were similar to those struck by the confederate government, only the closest scrutiny developing the difference, and this fact has had a tendency to lessen the interest in the genuine and original confederate half dollar. But even the restruck confederate half dollars command a premium of from $5 to $6 when well preserved.
Learned by Accident
That the confederate government had planned the issue of a cent piece came to light accidently. Some time between 1865 and 1870 a nickel coin was submitted to a coin dealer in Philadelphia for examination.
It ־was of about the same size as a United States cent, and showed a youthful head of Liberty on the obverse, wearing a liberty cap, around the border being inscribed “Confederate States of America.” Below was the date “1861.” On the reverse were the words “one cent,” in the center of a wreath emblematic of the products of the Southern states and composed of small ears of corn and wheat and tiny hogsheads, with a miniature cotton bale in the middle of the wreath.
In tracing the origin of the piece the fact was developed that the dies were cut by a Philadelphia engraver by the name of Lovett, who, upon being approached in 1873 concerning the matter, admitted, with considerable reluctance, that he had engraved the dies for the coin upon a commission from the confederate authorities.
B. E. Walker
Referring to the Canadian banking system, B. E. Walker, president of the Canadian Bank of Commerce, said at the New York Chamber of Commerce annual banquet Thursday evening:
“I was particularly requested to say something regarding our banking system, but I have so recently spoken to the American Bankers Association regarding yours that I hesitate to refer to the subject again, further than to add to my remarks at Denver regarding what Alexander Hamilton had tried to do in banking for the United States, the fact that when you threw his system overboard we picked it up and based our first charters largely on the charter of the first United States bank, and that we have clung to this, building it up to suit our purposes, until we have a system which, whether suitable for other countries or not, admirably serves our purposes both as to the individual and as to the nation as a whole.
"The difference between the two countries stated in the smallest compass is that instead of about 17,000 individual banks we have thirty banks with 1,900 branches, and these banks being few in number, and each large in capital and importance, they are trusted to manage their own reserves, to issue credit notes, to hold the deposits of the government—one being selected as the chief banker for all important government business—and to open branches even in foreign countries, thus developing not only a local but a great international force in the finances and trade of the country.
“Next to transportation, adequate banking is one of the most important requisites. The number of bank branches in Canada is 1,900, in comparison with about 640 ten years ago. The growth in the railroads and banking will suggest without further detail what the strain of providing new towns, new schools, churches, teachers, doctors, lawyers, trading people of all classes, the early stages of manufacturing and all the other accessories of civilization has been.”
That the confederate government contemplated the issue of a metallic currency is certain, though coins distinctively associated with the confederacy never appeared in general circulation. Designs for a half dollar and a cent were made, dies cut, and a few coins of each denomination struck in various metals. These coins now rank high with American collectors.
It was some time after the war—17 or 18 years—that the first evidence of the existence of a confederate half dollar came to light. In January, 1879, B. F. Taylor, M. 1).. secretary and treasurer of the Louisiana state board of health, wrote to E. Mason, Jr., a well-known Philadelphia numismatist, and informed him that he had a confederate coin in his possession. A good deal of doubt was at first felt about the coin’s genuineness, but investigation revealed the fact that at least four silver 50-cent pieces were struck by the confederate authorities at the New Orleans mint in 1861.
Planned to Use Mint
It seems that when the confederates seized the United States mint at New Orleans they conceived the idea of an issue of confederate coins. It is fairly certain, however, that after the mint fell into their hands, all valuable bullion was used for regular United States half-dollars, says a writer in the New York Sun.
The former officers of the mint were retained when the state of Louisiana turned the establishment over to the confederate states, and in April, 1861, Secretary Memminger of the confederate treasury ordered that designs for a half dollar should be submitted to him. Several designs were offered for his approval, although the accepted one is the only design on record.
This bore an obverse identical with the regular United States half dollar of 1861, the well known seated figures of the Goddess of Liberty, surrounded by 13 stars, with the date 1861. The reverse design, on the contrary, was of an entirely original character.
In the center of the field was a shield which bore seven stars, one for each seceding state. Above the shield was a liberty cap, while surrounding the central design was a wreath composed of sugar cane and cotton. Around the border at the top was the inscription: “Confederate States of America,” and underneath was the denomination, “Half Dol.”
These dies were cut by an engraver named A. H. M. Peterson, and the coins were struck by Conrad Schmidt, foreman of the coining room. When the dies came to the coiner they were found to be unsuitable for the regular press, so four pieces were struck on the old-fashioned screw press.
Dr. Taylor Chief Coiner
Dr. Taylor was the chief coinc-r at the mint in 1861, and in his letters to Mr. Mason he stated that one of the four pieces was sent to the confederate government, the second to Prof. Biddle of the University of Louisiana, the third to Dr. E. Ames of New Orleans, while the fourth was kept by himself .
The four pieces were all that were coined from the dies, for owing to scarcity of silver bullion, the mint was shut down on April 30, 1861. Only one of the original pieces can now be located, and this brought $870.
Some time in the seventies the reverse die fell into the possession of a firm of coin dealers in New York, who are credited with having restruck at least 500 regular United States half dollars of 1861 from the confederate reverse die after having removed the original United States reverse.