United States Coin of the Week: Condition Rarity Rhode Island Ship Token to Highlight June 2012 Baltimore Auction

By James Matthews, Senior Numismatist & Consignment Director, U.S. Coins

A PCGS/CAC MS-63 Example of the Betts-561, W-1730 Type

For the last several weeks I have been hard at work with the rest of the Stack’s Bowers Galleries team preparing the catalog for our upcoming June Baltimore Auction. While researching and writing descriptions for a very nice colonial and early American medal consignment earlier this week I came across a simply beautiful Rhode Island Ship medal certified MS-63 by PCGS and verified by CAC. The medal is a brass striking of the Without Wreath Below Ship Guide Book variety, attributed alternately as Betts-562 and W-1730. A lustrous and brassy deep golden piece, the surfaces also exhibit lovely pale olive highlights. Both sides are minimally marked under low magnification and present exceptionally well to the unassisted eye. We do note a few tiny fissures, best seen with a glass, below the ship at the 6 o'clock, trivial in import and mentioned solely for accuracy. An enigmatic Colonial era token -- or medal, to be more precise -- for which the jury is still out regarding exact origin and meaning, although the following information certainly provides clues as to the relationship of this historic type to pivotal events during the American Revolution. The particular PCGS/CAC MS-63 example that we are offering as a highlight in our upcoming June Baltimore Auction is a pleasing piece all around that is sure to see spirited bidding.

At least one of these medals survives with the word VLUGTENDE below Admiral Howe’s ship, which is Dutch for “fleeing” and refers to one of the Revolutionary War battles for the strategic area surrounding Newport, Rhode Island. Fearing possible British reprisals for commemorating their defeat, the potentially offensive word was scraped off a number of the medals which survive. Further efforts removed this word from the die and an ornament was engraved in this area to further hide the alteration. The initial varieties are quite rare, but once the die had been politically softened, a fair number of additional pieces were struck, most of course having long since disappeared. With these particular battles for Newport, Rhode Island raging in 1778 and 1779 the outcome of the American Revolutionary War was still far from certain, and one had to be careful just how many feathers they ruffled with the British still a formidable force and world power. As these historical pieces are further studied, much can be learned and their popularity will no doubt grow with collectors. History records nature’s assistance in the form of a windy storm during one of these battles, which would certainly have brought considerable challenges to the British in maneuvering their wind-driven warships off the coast. Rarely were such battles simply two competing forces throwing lead and iron at each other to diminish the living opposition and their weaponry, but rather most clashes of arms during the late 1700s were also fraught with complexities of weather and sickness.

The island that the soldiers are marching across on the reverse of the Rhode Island Ship medal is identical in shape to Aquidneck Island, as readily seen on a modern day map of Rhode Island -- this fact was pointed out to my fellow cataloger here at Stack’s Bowers Galleries Frank Van Valen by his long-time friend and fellow numismatist, John Kraljevich, a student of -- and expert in -- the coinage and medallic issues of the American Colonial era. Newport, Rhode Island, the home of Commodore Matthew Calbraith Perry’s family, is located on Aquidneck Island. In 1824 during his visit to America, the Marquis de Lafayette insisted on visiting Newport to pay his respects to Mrs. Sarah Wallace Alexander Perry, widow of Captain Christopher Perry (an American privateer and father of Oliver Hazard and Matthew Calbraith Perry), who spent time in an English prison during the American Revolution for his high seas activities.