(40) EARLY COPPERS - SHAFTSBURY VERMONT HOARD - 1700'S

(40) EARLY COPPERS - SHAFTSBURY VERMONT HOARD RESERVE IS SET AT $275.00

(40) Early Coppers from American and Canadian Colonial Period including Post-Colonial American: most dates between 1721 and 1805.

Lot includes:
1. 1787 CONNECTICUT HALF CENT
2. 1721-H FRENCH COLONIES COPPER SOU
3. 1771 FRENCH COLONIES LIARD
4. 1764 PORTUGAL COPPER 10 REIS W/COUNTERSTAMP
5. 1748 PORTUGAL COPPER 10 REIS
6. (10) 1791-1793 FRENCH BRONZE FROM CANADA
7. (11) 1796-1800 FRENCH COPPER FROM CANADA
8. (2) 1771 COPPER 1 SKILLLING
9.  (3) 1800-1804 USA CENT AND HALF CENT
10. 1786 VERMONT PLOW COPPER - EYE W/RAYS & STARS
11. 1805 HIBERNIA HALF PENNY
12. 1766 HIBERNIA HALF PENNY
13. 1690-MARCH BRASS JAMES II "GUN MONEY"
14. 1736 COPPER "DUIT" EAST INDIES/NEW AMSTERDAM
15. 1792 UNKNOWN COPPER - APPEARS TO BE OVERSTRUCK OVER ANOTHER COIN WITH "LIBERTY" IN LEGEND.
 
Not pictured due to EBAY (12) maximum photograph limit:
16. 1750 UNKNOWN COPPER - "CROWN WITH ARROWS" HAS STRONG FULL DATE, RIMS & LEGEND.
17. 1815 UNKNOWN BRONZE - HAS FULL DATE, RIMS & LEGENDS BUT THEY ARE WEAK ON ONE SIDE.
18. 1811 UNKNOWN COPPER TOKEN - WITH SAILING SHIP ON ONE SIDE & "HALF PENNY TOKEN" THE OTHER SIDE - HAS STRONG FULL DATE, RIMS & LEGEND.

THE SHAFTBURY VERMONT STORY* (See note)

Like many hoard stories, there is always a catalyist that begins a chain of events that leads to the discovery. This one starts with a barn addition to an original farm homestead in Shaftsbury, Vermont.

The home was built during the early 1700’s near a trading route that paralleled the Hudson River Valley from New York to Lake Champlain and ultimately lead into French controlled Canada. Now called old route 7A or the Ethan Allen Parkway, we know there was a strong trading connection with the French due to the sprinkling of French Sols and Deniers found in the hoard. Additional varieties include coins coming from Ireland through Canada and Portugal coming from both Canada and the maritime Portuguese communities established in New Amsterdam and Rhode Island. The house was also used extensively as an boarding house/inn for travelers which also may account for the variety of coppers.

In the late 1800’s a barn addition was built adjoining the North side of the house and the builders excavated the house foundation to the stone footings. This was a big mistake because the house site sloped in the direction of the new addition and the entry of the new barn was at the same elevation as the bottom of the house foundation. Add about 100 years of freezing and thawing ground and the stone house foundation began collapsing.

In 1984 a builder was hired to restore the house foundation and upon exploratory excavation of the root cellar the hoard was found in a wood and metal box. Astonishingly, the owner was not surprised.

 It turns out that the property had been in his family for generations and the legend of the hoards (yes, more than one) had been passed down including the locations until a family dispute that began in the 1970’s between brother and sister, kept the location from being passed along. The sibling’s father, still living on the property, died before revealing anything.

The property was left in joint ownership to the siblings who were themselves in their 70’s when their father died. Both had long left Vermont and had no interest in the property but could not come to any agreement to either sell the property or to maintain it. They could not even rent the property, since it had no indoor plumbing, no heating other than a woodstove and just basic wiring for electricity. The property soon fell into disrepair and languished until the brothers’ son indicated an interest in the property and convinced his aunt and father to sell him the property using a 40 year contract for deed. Although the siblings recall their father speaking of the hoard, both dismissed its value since their recollection was that it was only “pennies” with the real valuable “silver and gold coins” long removed by prior generations during difficult financial times.

Unlike many hoard stories, this one was kept quiet as the son relished his privacy and since the house was not his primary residence, he feared treasure hunters that could easily gain access to the 300 acre property. Now secrets like this are indeed hard to keep quiet, but this one was because the builder was a childhood best friend of the son.

With the advent of the internet and research by many, the Red Book listing of “Official” Colonials is being challenged everyday. Yeoman’s original list of Colonials was largely based upon old, northeast coin collections of the rich and famous. There is growing evidence that the circulating coppers from the Gulf Coast and those that came down from Canada are just as legitimate to be called “Colonials” or "Post-Colonials" as those listed in the Red Book. All one has to do is look at the listing changes taking place in the Charlton Standard Catalogue of Canadian Coins (the equivalent of the Red Book in Canada) and note the new listings which now include Colonial period coins from France, Great Britain, Ireland, Portugal, Spain and Spanish America. Catalogers like Cross and others are now making a long justified change to encompass the true variety of circulating coins one would have encountered during this time period…..

*NOTE: One EBay member sent an email to me claiming that one of my previous listings of hoard coppers should have been all the same color, inferring that they were not hoard coins. The exchange is as follows (my comments as best as I can recall, his comments are exact):


FIRST COMMENT BY EBAYER:

'Hoard' coins, that have been stored in the same place for years, tend to take on a similar if not the same patination, however these coins' patination looks rather diverse, strongly suggesting that they were much more recently 'put together.'

MY RESPONSE:

I am no expert but would not the color vary due to the fact that the coins are made of widely different metal purity and compositions?

EBAYER RESPONSE:

If all these coins were stored together in the same environment for as long as is suggested they would all have a similar patination regardless of composition. There is just way too much variance for them all to have come from the same place. You are, of course, entitled to your opinion, however, these are obviously not a 'hoard.'

MY RESPONSE:

So the color should be exactly the same regardless of metal composition even if the coins have been out of the original environment for more than 25 years and stored in various places in a humid environment like Florida? Can you please tell me the research you have based this on or point me to a website that has this information?

EBAYER RESPONSE:

'The rate at which patina accumulated on a coin is proportional to the concentration of pollutants in the air. The nasty, sulfur-laden air over a major city will tone a coin faster than the air in an isolated forest. Local environmental factors also can speed the process. Silverware, both sterling and plate, is famous for tarnishing rapidly in the presence of egg yolks, which have a significant amount of organically bound sulfur. The black tarnish is nothing more than silver sulfide. Coins stored in the same environment for a number of years, over decades or even centuries will all display a similar patina.'

MY RESPONSE:

I think you have formulated your opinion either on something you have read or heard, or you have first hand experience or you are making this up. So I ask again, on what research or information do you base your conclusions on?

EBAYER’S LAST RESPONSE:

I can see that this is pointless, however you should know that I am the author of several papers concerning contemporary counterfeit halfpence, and I can tell you that the story in your description is 'formulated' and that the coins were thrown together only recently. I've heard every story imaginable, since 1969, and this is just another.
Good luck with your auctions.


CONCLUSION

The EBAYER did not back up any of his comments but he did succeed in leaving me with my own doubts about the guy I bought the coins from, so I decided to ask some of the members of my regional coin association, including some ancient coin numismatists and some colonial copper specialists. I received varying opinions but generally they told me the EBAYER was partially right but only if the coins were buried in the ground or were in a humid unchanging environment. In fairness to the EBAYER, I did use the word "excavation" in the story which may imply to some that the coins were buried. The box containing the coins was found in a root cellar under a false floor. Root cellars are nice and dry and have some air circulation; not too little, not too much - about as perfect a place as you could find back then to preserve something. Additionally, the club members mostly agreed that the varying metal compositions and 25 years out of the original location would affect the color. I can't prove the story, so the final decision is up to you.