1857 James Buchanan Indian Peace Medal. First Size. By Salathiel Ellis and Joseph Willson. Julian IP-34, Prucha-30. Silver. Extremely Fine. 75.6 mm. 2796.8 grains. Neatly pierced for suspension at 12 oclock, as issued. Medium to light silver-gray with a gently mottled appearance and generous traces of prooflike character remaining through the fields. Boldly struck at least twice, and probably more times to bring up the high relief of this particular issue. The high rims on both sides are nicked and bumped, having taken on a bit of the standard wear, while the remaining surfaces show many minor nicks and scratches, all typical for one of these medals. However, none of the marks is terribly serious or distracting and the medal overall has unusually nice sharpness and appearance.<p>The reverse design used here would prove very short-lived, as it was introduced for the medals of Buchanans administration and used for only one more president, Abraham Lincoln. Its use on the Buchanan medals represents the first known depiction of what has become known as the game of baseball, in medallic form. However, it is first by a rather small margin as, in 1861, J.A. Bolen cut dies for the Pioneer Baseball Club medals, a commission by a local club with baseball as the central theme. Prior to a set of official rules of baseball being written down and generally agreed to in the United States, in 1845, the game existed in somewhat varied forms for a long period, and is believed to have been imported from England where it was first mentioned in print, in 1744. Baseball may at first seem a curious entry into a Peace medal design, but it was part of a broad scheme to depict the ways of Euro-American settlers as productive and enjoyable in stark contrast to Native life, as depicted on the same medal, as savage and woeful.<p>Your catalogers (JP) own extensive survey of specimens has revealed just 16 genuine Buchanan medals of this size, with five of these in institutional collections. This one has not been offered at auction since our (Bowers and Merenas) November 2001 sale, having spent the majority of the last two decades in an important private collection of Peace medals. Ex our (Bowers and Merenas) sale of the Tree Many Feathers Collection, November 2001, lot 5174; Rex Stark; Richard Ulbrich; Rex Stark FPL, January 2018 #1-M; Anthony Terranova.
