1811 Classic Head Half Cent. C-2. Rarity-3. Close Date. MS-63 BN (PCGS). CAC. Type: Type V: Classic Head.Design: Obv: Liberty faces left, her hair bound by a fillet inscribed LIBERTY. Thirteen stars are arranged around the border, seven left and six right, with the date 1811 below. Rev: A single branch bound at the bottom by a single bowed ribbon surrounds the denomination HALF CENT. The legend UNITED STATES OF AMERICA is around the border.Weight Standard: 84 grains (5.44 grams).Diameter: 23.5 mm.Die Variety: Cohen-2, Breen-2, Gilbert-1. Obv: The date slants left with all four digits close. The letters I and ERTY in LIBERTY are repunched, repunching also evident at the upper right of the first digit 1 in the date, lower left of the adjacent digit 8. This is the only use of this obverse die. Rev: The highest leaf on the branch extends well beyond the final letter S in STATES. This reverse was used for both die marriages of the 1811 half cent, C-2 the later pairing.Die State: Manley 2.0, described as "very scarce." Obv: Clash marks are evident behind Libertys head and around the hair curls above the digits 11 in the date. Rev: Perfect.Edge: Plain.Mintage: Federal records report a mintage of 63,140 half cents for calendar year 1811, all of which were delivered on July 9. Many of these coins are believed to have been struck from the 1810-dated obverse, the actual mintage from 1811-dated dies (significantly) fewer than 63,140 pieces. R.W. Julian believes that the mintage for this issue may be less than 30,000, if not 25,000 coins.Estimated Surviving Population for the Issue: 275 to 800 coins in all grades.Estimated Surviving Population for the Die Variety: Rarity-3: 200 to 600 coins in all grades.Strike: Otherwise sharply struck with virtually full denticulation around both sides, the left peripheral design elements are soft due to this coin having been struck from nonparallel dies.Surfaces: Bold medium brown and antique copper patina throughout, both sides also reveal a few intermingled blushes of pale rose-red. Light surface scale in the field at the upper obverse border, concentration of carbon on the reverse between the letter M in AMERICA and the wreath. There are no distracting marks, the surfaces hard and tight with a bold satin texture.Commentary: Even before cannon had been fired at Fort Sumter, signaling the start of the Civil War, 1811 half cents were a desirable commodity. As early as 1859, Montroville W. Dickeson described them as "rare and valuable, as they are to be found but in few cabinets." Today, this date remains a key to the series, and examples are eagerly sought in all grades. Although overall not quite as scarce as its C-1 counterpart, C-2 is the rarer of the two 1811-dated varieties in Mint State. To the best of our knowledge, only four survivors from these dies have been described as Uncirculated in recent decades:1 - PCGS MS-65+ BN. Ex New Netherlands Coin Company, April 26, 1949; Harold S. Bareford; William J. Bareford, June 8, 1984; Jules Reiver; R. Tettenhorst; Missouri Cabinet; Ira & Larry Goldbergs sale of the Missouri Cabinet Collection, January 2014, lot 104.2 - PCGS MS-63 BN. Ex Heritages CSNS Signature Auction of April 2014, lot 5501; ESM Collection. <em>The present example</em>.3 - MS-63 BN. Ex Louis E. Eliasberg, Sr.; our (Bowers and Merenas) sale of the Louis E. Eliasberg, Sr. Collection, May 1996, lot 436.4 - MS-60. Ex Richard Picker, August 1, 1957; our (Bowers and Merenas) sale of the Norweb Collection, Part I, October 1987, lot 68.The Mints delivery of 63,140 half cents on July 9, 1811 exhausted its existing supply of copper planchets, and no more were ordered for this denomination for more than a decade. From the ESM Collection. Earlier from Heritages CSNS Signature Auction of April 2014, lot 5501.
