1787 Connecticut Copper. Miller 3-G.1, W-2805. Rarity-6-. Mailed Bust Left—Dr. Hall Ink on Edge—VF-30 (PCGS).109.6 grains. A Clark Reverse Plate Coin. Glossy, chocolate brown surfaces are worn to a slightly lighter tan hue at the high points of the devices and legends, the coin retaining a very choice appearance despite some minor planchet flaws and old thin scratches on both sides. This visually very appealing example ranks among the finest known of this distinctive Machin’s Mills type, the only bust left type among the 1787- and 1788-dated types of Machin’s Mills style. Struck from the failing states of both dies, the obverse cracked and sunken around AUCTO, the reverse showing the early stages of the diagonal crack from E of ET towards the center. Overall comparable to the lightly porous but less striated Oechsner coin, finer than the Taylor-Perkins coin, and bested by the superb Crosby plate-Miller plate-Ford example called About Uncirculated and which brought over $20,000 in 2005. This coin once graced the cabinet of Dr. Thomas Hall, whose white ink on edge attribution “3 G” is boldly visible around the 4 o’clock position when viewed from the obverse. Owned by generations of numismatic illuminati, this coin is headed into its next great Connecticut cabinet on auction night.From the Robert M. Martin Collection. Ex Dr. Thomas Hall; Virgil Brand; Brand Estate (sold for $0.75 on May 17, 1935); B.G. Johnson (sold for $3.50); Eric P. Newman; Eric P. Newman Numismatic Education Society; Heritage’s sale of the Eric. P. Newman Collection, Part IV, May 2014, lot 30081.
