Liberty Head Gold Double Eagles (1849–1907)

Congress Authorized the Double Eagle in Response to the California Gold Rush, and the Coin Became the Primary Instrument of International Gold Settlement for the Next Half Century

The Act of March 3, 1849, signed by President James K. Polk on the final day of his administration, authorized the gold dollar and the double eagle simultaneously, both as instruments for converting the massive influx of California placer gold into federal coinage. The denomination had no precedent in federal law; the Mint Act of 1792 had specified the eagle as the largest gold coin. Numismatist David Lange described the double eagle as "a banker's coin intended to simplify transfers of large sums between financial institutions and between nations," and the characterization proved accurate: within a few years of its introduction, the twenty-dollar gold piece had displaced all smaller gold denominations in large-scale domestic and international commerce. Only one 1849 double eagle survives, a presentation piece in the National Numismatic Collection at the Smithsonian Institution. Commercial production began with 1850-dated coins struck at Philadelphia and New Orleans. Longacre placed Liberty facing left on the obverse, wearing a coronet inscribed LIBERTY and a pearl necklace, flanked by thirteen stars with the date below; the reverse depicts a heraldic eagle surrounded by the inscription UNITED STATES OF AMERICA above and the denomination below. Longacre's initials JBL appear on the truncation of the bust, making the double eagle the first federal gold coin to bear the designer's initials. The denomination expression on the reverse read TWENTY D. from 1849 through 1876, with the abbreviation giving way to the fully spelled TWENTY DOLLARS when the third type was introduced in 1877.¹

The 1861 Paquet Reverse Was Recalled Within Days at Philadelphia but 20,000 Reached Commerce at San Francisco Before the Stop Order Arrived

IN GOD WE TRUST was added to the double eagle in 1866, prompted by the same wartime religious sentiment that had placed it on the two-cent piece in 1864. The motto appeared on a scroll above the eagle beginning with 1866 production, dividing the series into the No Motto Type I and the With Motto types that followed. A separate design event five years earlier produced one of the most consequential rarities in the series. In 1860, Assistant Engraver Anthony C. Paquet revised the reverse with taller, narrower letters to improve the coin's legibility; production of 1861-dated coins began at both Philadelphia and San Francisco before the Mint discovered that the revised reverse left the rim too shallow to protect the design from abrasion. Philadelphia halted immediately; only two business strike examples of the 1861 Philadelphia Paquet Reverse are known to have survived the recall. The stop-production order did not reach the San Francisco Mint in time, and approximately 20,000 1861-S Paquet Reverse double eagles entered circulation before the order arrived and the dies were changed. Philadelphia’s immediate compliance with the recall created a near-unobtainable coin; the communication lag to San Francisco distributed a major rarity across enough transactions that collectors can locate one. The practical consequence is that the two 1861 Paquet issues occupy entirely different collecting tiers: the 1861-S Philadelphia has appeared at public auction only twice in the modern era, while the 1861-S can be found by any collector prepared to spend at the level the series demands. The series ran from five mints over 57 years. Philadelphia, New Orleans (from 1841 in this denomination), and San Francisco (from 1854) produced the Type I coins; Carson City joined with the With Motto type in 1870 and continued through 1893; Denver struck the denomination only in 1906 and 1907 before the Saint-Gaudens design replaced Longacre's portrait.²

Building the Set

A three-type set requires one coin of each major reverse type. For Type I, the most common dates are the high-mintage Philadelphia issues of the early 1850s and 1857, though the recovery of the SS Central America beginning in 1987 and the subsequent release of approximately 7,500 pristine 1857-S double eagles to the market starting in 2000 permanently changed what is available to a Type I collector in upper grades. Gem (Mint State 65 or finer) 1857-S examples that had not existed at any price before the recovery are now the most accessible Gem Type I coins in private hands; that single recovery event did more to expand what is achievable for a Type I collector than any other development in the denomination’s numismatic history. For Type II, the 1873 and 1874 Philadelphia dates are the most available in circulated and lower Mint State grades. For Type III, the 1900 through 1904 Philadelphia and San Francisco dates are the most common in all grades. A complete date-and-mint set spanning all three types and approximately 150 combinations is among the most demanding projects in the gold series: at minimum ten dates run into six figures in circulated grades, including the 1854-O, 1856-O, 1861-S Paquet, 1870-CC, and the three Proof-only issues, and dozens more require mid-five figures for a collector-quality circulated example. The primary specialist reference is Garrett, Jeff, and Ron Guth, Encyclopedia of U.S. Gold Coins, 1795–1933, 2nd ed. (Atlanta: Whitman Publishing, 2008).³