In the third part of this series, we look at the gold coinage of 1864. This was, of course, a pivotal year in the war’s outcome as well as a very interesting year in the history of American gold coinage. Mintage figures were mostly very low and a number of rare, undervalued coins are known.

The first installment of this three-part article discussed the various Civil War gold issues struck in 1861 and 1862. The second part looks at the very interesting gold issues from 1863; a pivotal year in the history of the brutal war and a very significant year in the annals of American numismatic history. 1863 $1.00 1863 Gold Dollar: While 6,200 business strikes were made, this is a rarer date than most casual collectors know.

The combination of history and numismatic significance makes the United Sates gold coins struck during the Civil War era (1861 to 1865) a fascinating possible collecting area for the sophisticated numismatist. Let’s take a look at each coin produced during this year and determine the most practical grade range for the collector. 1861 $1.00 NGC AU55 1861 Gold Dollar.

In the first part of this article, I discussed the ins and outs of assembling a year set of Liberty Head eagles from 1838 through 1866. In case you’ve already forgotten the premise, it’s that a collector can purchase one example of each year that this denomination/type was produced in order to save money and still be an active participant in this very interesting (and very long-lived) series.

For most collectors, assembling a comlete set of Liberty Head eagles is a daunting task, to say the least. There are 184 different issues (including major varieties) struck from 1838 to 1907. While none of these individual coins is impossible to locate, many are rare to very rare and nearly every issue struck prior to 1878 is rare in higher grades and quite expensive.

To my way of thinking, early gold coins (i.e., those struck prior to 1834) and among the most collectible and interesting areas in all of American numismatics. No, these coins aren’t cheap and they are, in reality, somewhat overvalued when you compare them to many mid-19th century Liberty Head issues. But there is a pride-of-ownership factor associated with owning a 200 year old gold coin that you get from nothing else. 1.