2165) The Ship Of Gold (SS Central America), USA - (Part II): A historic 54-pound Gold Rush ingot which sank to the bottom of the Sea in the shipwreck SS Central America in 1857 was recovered 131 years later:
Links to SS Central America (The Ship Of Gold) posts on this blog:
Many treasure and coin collectors are fascinated by coins that are found deep under the Ocean, that were once part of the cargo of ships' treasure that sank.
Over the course of history, tens of thousands of such ships have sank on inland, coastal waters and deep seas with valuable coins and gold nuggets/precious metal pieces on board. Collectors find these coins particularly fascinating, as they come with a story/history behind them and how they ended up where they were found, sometimes hundreds of years after the ship sank.
This type of coin and precious metal piece is also appreciated because it is rare. Out of thousands of ships that have sunk with treasure on board, very few of them are ever discovered.
They are also historic artefacts that tell us important facts about different periods of history. Collectors value/prize them because many such coins are sometimes found still in high grades, especially Gold coins that typically do not corrode from exposure to salt water. Silver Coins generally do become damaged and corroded from this kind of exposure, but sometimes, if they were stored in safes, they can still be found in high grades, while most recovered Silver Coins require specialised conservation methods.
Many of the famous treasure ships that sank and whose coins were later discovered/recovered are in amazingly pristine condition.
During the California Gold Rush - A glut of Gold influx raises the price of Silver more than that of Gold leaving the US Mint in a dilemma:
Two major varieties in the 27 year life-span of the "No-Motto Seated Halves" (Half Dollar varieties) are quite interesting.
Both were direct results of the California Gold Rush, which totally upset the delicate balance the US Mint was striving to keep in the relative values of gold and silver in US Coinage.
As huge quantities of gold poured out of California, Gold values dropped in relation to Silver. Soon 200 Half Dollars melted into bullion would buy not $100 in Gold but $106.60. This Gold in turn could be exchanged at face value for more Silver Coins.
By 1853, Silver Coins were worth more as metal than as money and melting of coins became rampant.
The Mint was at its wit's end on how to combat this imbalance and finally struck upon the idea of reducing the amount of silver in the coins to restore the balance and to stop minted Silver Half Dollars from being melted by unscrupulous elements.
So the overall weight of the Silver Half Dollar got trimmed from 13.36 grams to 12.44 grams.
To bring attention to this change, the Mint placed arrowheads alongside the date and rays around the eagle. The arrows remained in place for three years, but the rays were removed in 1854. This created two significant varieties - the Arrows-and-Rays Half Dollar (1853) and no arrows (1856). Both are very popular coin variants.
I have a Silver "Seated Liberty" half dollar in my collection, minted in 1956 with the "S" Mint Mark (San Francisco Mint) with the trimmed weight/silver content, which uncannily connects my Silver Coin to the aftermath of the California Gold Rush, which can be accessed at the following link:
The Ship of Gold - "SS Central America":
On 12.09.1857, the ship "SS Central America" sank to the bottom of the Atlantic Ocean 160 miles offshore from Charleston, South Carolina, when a hurricane sank the sidewheel steamer some 200 miles off the South Carolina coast .
Four-hundred twenty-five of the ship’s 578 passengers perished. The wreck of the "SS Central America" carrying a treasure of around 7,000 Gold Coins and Gold nuggets and Gold Bars from the California Gold Rush and some 30,000 pounds of gold plummeted to the ocean floor, thought lost until their discovery in 1988 by Tommy Thompson, the subject (and author) of several books and more than a few lawsuits.
The "SS Central America" earned her nickname the "Ship of Gold" because she was carrying her precious cargo - several tons of gold coins, as well as, raw nuggets from the California Gold Rush.
When she went down, the vessel took with her an amount of gold that would have been valued today at $300,000,000 (or 300 million dollars). The gold bided its time at the bottom of the ocean, before it was recovered some 131 years later.
In 1988, more than 7,000 gold coins were recovered from the wreck, making it a household name among shipwreck historians and Coin Collectors. But that was not all.
The Tale of the 54 Pound Gold Bar:
This giant bar started as gold dust collected during that mad rush toward the Pacific and was made whole by Justh & Hunter, a firm that weighed and assayed these shimmering flecks of fortune found by the "Forty-Niners of the Gold Rush".
Had this massive gold bar, the largest Justh & Hunter in the world, successfully transited from California to New York (and to Philadelphia) as initially planned, it probably would have been melted down, disbursed, disappeared.
Instead, it was swallowed by the Atlantic Ocean in the fall of 1857 when the ship in which it was being carried in, sank to the bottom of the Ocean and spent more than 130 years a mile and a half beneath the water’s surface and in the crushed hull of a sunken vessel.
The 866.19-ounce ingot remains bright yellow despite more than a century at sea.
Its markings, including the serial number (4221), value ($15971.93), make-up (892 fine) and the firm name, remain as legible today, as the day the brick was stamped.
And its significance cannot be undersold. This was the largest Justh & Hunter discovered in the wreckage of the SS Central America, the ship that was transporting tons of Gold Rush Coins and ingots. Its disappearance was the country’s worst peacetime disaster at sea.
For more than 20 years, this mighty, mammoth ingot has been among the treasures from the S.S. Central America acquired by the California Gold Marketing Group, which is majority owned by Dwight Manley, once the agent for such NBA superstars as Dennis Rodman and Karl Malone.
Numerous gold ingots from the "SS Central America" have been sold before, among them a 174.04-ounce Harris, Marchand bar that brought $528,000 in January 2019.
But this gold bar is among the most sizable and significant ingots from the “Ship of Gold” ever made available to the public and the largest ever being offered at auction by Heritage Auctions.
To put in perspective the contemporary value of this ingot, consider that in 1857, in New York City, the average pay for a carpenter was $1.79 per day. The 19th century work week was six days, so our average carpenter made $10.74 per week. At the stated value on this ingot of $15,971.93, this single ingot could pay the weekly wages of 1,487 carpenters. It is little wonder that the loss of the S.S. Central America shook the financial markets in New York and was a contributing factor to the Panic of 1857.
Most of the treasures discovered aboard the “Ship of Gold” were eventually sold, among them the 80-pound ingot called "Eureka" sold in 2001 to a private collector for $8 million, making it “the most valuable piece of currency in the world,” according to the San Francisco Chronicle at the time.
The immense gold brick is too heavy to lift easily or gracefully – something about molecular density making it much heavier than its 54 pounds, but also, perhaps, something to do with the history it carries.
What an extraordinary tale this ingot could tell, one worth far more than its weight in gold, including how weeds and coral had grown around it over the years, prompting the discoverers to call the area the "Garden of Gold".
29) The first ever "No Show" Panda, USA: Minted in Platinum (One Oz.), Gold (One Oz.) and Silver (50.0 grams) Medal Variants: American Numismatic Association cancels the "2020-World's Fair of Money", scheduled to be held in Pittsburg, Pennsylvania on 04-08/08/2020
30) Women's Suffrage, USA: 100th Anniversary of the 19th Amendment's Ratification (1920-2020), that endorsed Women's Right to Vote: Date of Coins/Medals issue: 18.08.2020
Links to SS Central America (The Ship Of Gold) posts on this blog:
Vinod Khurana has commented:
ReplyDelete"Very interesting history of gold & silver coins in USA."
Thank you, Vinodji.
DeleteRajan Trikha has commented:
ReplyDelete"Very ancient and historical insight 👍"
This story is one of my favorites, Trikha sahab.
DeleteVikram Bhatnagar has commented:
ReplyDelete"Old is Gold and Gold never ages! 😇"
Apparently, Gold bars and coins do not corrode at the bottom of the sea too, Vikram. Their lure endures forever.
DeleteSantosh Khanna has commented:
ReplyDelete"Very impressive! Thanks for sharing this interesting post."
Thank you, Khanna sahab.
Delete