Like many patterns struck for sale to collectors from this era, this coin was struck after Longacre had passed away on the first day of 1869. The dies were executed by William Barber, who had succeeded Longacre as Chief Engraver soon after his passing. On some points, he slightly improved the designs but generally they were the same as designed in the previous years. Full sets were made, of various designs, metals and denomination. Other pieces, such as the present, are mules solely created for the intent of selling to individual collectors.

This practice was very common at the Philadelphia Mint, which could have advertized itself as the largest coin dealer nationwide. However, the creation and selling of these pieces was kept low profile, and generally a collector needed an inside job to get a hand on the freshly minted pieces. Because of this, information is generally scarce regarding mintages, and who bought them for what price.

In Pollock, a total of 6 or 7 individual pieces are identified, of which 3 are permanently impounded in museum collections. Another is the gem brown piece which came out of the Harry W. Bass collection and which sold for $5,290 in its May 1999 sale. That piece has been of the market since. Another piece has been graded by ANACS as PR-64RB, but that might be the same coin as the one we offer here. It was offered twice in the past 20 years, and those 3 offerings were the only public auctions of this variety.

The present piece is wonderfully toned, with original Mint red color remaining in the protected areas. The fields are clean, with only some small hairlines keeping it out of a gem or finer holder. The strike is exceptionally strong, and the mirrored fields highlight the semi-frosted devices. A lovely representative of this rare and popular pattern issue.