DECEMBER 22
1849•Liberty Head Double Eagle ($20)
2020•National Law Enforcement Commemorative Coin Designs Unveiled
The First Federal Double Eagle Is Struck
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On December 22, 1849, United States Mint Director Robert M. Patterson sent Treasury Secretary William M. Meredith an experimental example of America's newly authorized $20 gold coin—the double eagle—and asked for his approval. The piece represented the first federal attempt to strike what would become the nation's largest regular gold denomination. Only one 1849 double eagle is known to survive today, preserved in the Smithsonian Institution's National Numismatic Collection.
The coin was born directly from the California Gold Rush. Vast quantities of newly mined gold were pouring east, transforming American finance and overwhelming a coinage system whose largest denomination was the $10 eagle. Congress responded in March 1849 by authorizing two new gold coins at opposite ends of the scale: the tiny gold dollar and the massive $20 double eagle.
The gold dollar entered production quickly. The double eagle did not. Chief Engraver James B. Longacre struggled through months of technical and institutional difficulty before the first experimental pieces could finally be struck in late December. Even then, the design proved too difficult for normal steam-press production. The December 22 specimen was not the beginning of regular coinage—it was the dramatic final experiment before the denomination could be redesigned for circulation in 1850.
The California Gold Rush Changes American Money
Gold had been discovered at Sutter's Mill in California in January 1848.
News spread slowly at first, then explosively.
By 1849, tens of thousands of people were heading west in search of fortune.
The Gold Rush transformed California and altered the monetary economy of the entire United States.
Miners extracted enormous quantities of placer gold from streams and deposits.
Raw gold dust and nuggets were useful as commodities, but a modern economy needed standardized money.
Much of the metal eventually moved toward assay offices, private mints, and federal Mint facilities where it could be refined and converted into coin.
Before 1849, the largest regular United States gold coin was the $10 eagle.
That denomination had been created under the Coinage Act of 1792.
As the California gold supply increased, handling large values in $10 pieces became less efficient.
A larger coin could convert bullion into monetary form with fewer individual pieces.
Congress Creates Two New Gold Coins
On March 3, 1849, Congress authorized the gold dollar and the $20 double eagle.
The two denominations occupied opposite extremes.
The gold dollar would be tiny and convenient for relatively small transactions.
The double eagle would contain twenty dollars in gold and serve large-scale financial needs.
American gold denominations had inherited a distinctive naming system.
The $10 gold coin was the eagle.
The $5 coin was the half eagle.
The $2.50 coin was the quarter eagle.
A $20 coin was naturally twice an eagle—a double eagle.
Responsibility for designing the new federal coins fell to Chief Engraver James Barton Longacre.
Longacre had joined the Mint in 1844 after the death of Christian Gobrecht.
He was an accomplished portrait engraver but had comparatively limited experience creating dies for high-volume coinage machinery.
Longacre faced the difficult task of developing both the gold dollar and double eagle during the same year.
The gold dollar reached production in May 1849.
The double eagle became far more troublesome.
Its enormous size and deep relief created mechanical problems that smaller coins did not present to the same degree.
The Philadelphia Mint in the late 1840s was not a harmonious workplace.
Longacre encountered opposition from powerful Mint officials, including Chief Coiner Franklin Peale.
Personal rivalries and disputes over authority complicated what was already a difficult technical assignment.
Peale had traveled to Europe in the 1830s to study advanced minting technology.
He became deeply influential in the modernization of the Philadelphia Mint.
By 1849 he possessed substantial technical authority and experience with production machinery.
His relationship with Longacre became increasingly contentious.
Longacre's obverse featured a left-facing head of Liberty wearing a coronet inscribed “LIBERTY.”
Thirteen stars surrounded the portrait, with the date below.
The reverse displayed a heraldic eagle surrounded by elaborate ornamentation, rays, stars, inscriptions, and a double scroll carrying “E PLURIBUS UNUM.”
A Coin Built to Look Important
The double eagle was physically impressive.
At approximately 34 millimeters in diameter and more than 33 grams in weight, it was larger and heavier than other regular U.S. gold denominations.
Its face value represented substantial purchasing power in the nineteenth century.
The design needed to communicate that importance.
A sculptural design can look excellent in a model and still fail as a production coin.
Coinage dies must force metal into recessed design elements under enormous pressure.
If the relief is too deep, the metal may not flow sufficiently during a normal strike.
Increasing pressure can damage dies or machinery.
Months passed while Longacre worked on the double eagle.
By December, Mint officials were running out of time if they hoped to produce $20 coins bearing the 1849 date.
The year was almost over.
Finally, experimental dies were ready.
Mint Director Robert Patterson wrote to Treasury Secretary William M. Meredith on December 22.
He explained that after a delay beyond his control, he was finally able to send an enclosed double eagle for Meredith's judgment.
Patterson wanted an answer quickly so the Mint could strike as many pieces as possible during the few days remaining in the year.
The specimen sent to Meredith was not the result of ordinary mass-production coinage.
Later correspondence reveals that the December 22 piece had been struck using a heavy hand press.
That distinction became critical.
A design that could be forced into existence under exceptional pressure was not necessarily suitable for routine steam-powered production.
Numismatic research indicates that at least two 1849 double eagles were struck in gold.
Only one is known today.
The surviving piece eventually became part of the United States Mint Cabinet and is now held by the Smithsonian Institution's National Numismatic Collection.
The fate of the other 1849 gold double eagle is one of American numismatics' enduring mysteries.
Historical references have suggested that a specimen may have gone to Treasury Secretary Meredith.
Whatever its path, no second gold example has been conclusively identified in modern times.
One of America's Great Unique Coins
The Smithsonian's 1849 double eagle is therefore unique among presently known examples.
It cannot ordinarily be acquired by a private collector at any price.
Its significance comes not only from rarity but from its status as the experimental beginning of a denomination that would become central to American gold coinage.
The optimism of December 22 did not last.
Chief Coiner Franklin Peale attempted to strike the new design using the Mint's normal production process.
On December 24, he reported that the dies could not produce an acceptable impression through ordinary coining.
Peale specifically criticized the depth of Liberty's head on the obverse.
According to his report, the steel could not withstand the pressure required to bring up the design fully.
The problem was not merely aesthetic.
It threatened die life and reliable mass production.
Peale also complained that the portrait projected in a way that could interfere with stacking and expose the coin to abrasion.
Coins intended for banks and large transactions needed to stack efficiently.
A $20 gold coin was not simply a work of art; it was an industrial monetary product.
On Christmas Day, Patterson sent Meredith another letter.
He reminded the Treasury secretary that the December 22 specimen had been struck by heavy hand press.
Attempts to use the ordinary steam press had produced an “unhappy result.”
The obverse, Patterson concluded, was too high for practical coinage.
The technical failure ended hopes for a normal 1849 issue.
The Mint could not simply manufacture thousands of coins from dies that required exceptional pressure and failed under routine production conditions.
Longacre would have to modify the design.
Regular federal double eagle production began in 1850.
Philadelphia struck the majority of the first circulating $20 gold coins.
New Orleans also produced double eagles that year.
These 1850 coins—not the 1849 experimental pieces—constitute the first regular circulating federal double eagles.
Pattern Versus Regular Issue
The distinction is important for collectors.
The 1849 double eagle is classified as a pattern or experimental issue.
It tested a new denomination and design but was not released as a normal circulating coin.
The 1850 double eagle is the first collectible regular issue of the federal series.
The federal government was not actually the first American issuer to produce a $20 gold denomination.
Private and territorial coiners responded quickly to western gold discoveries.
Mormon coiners in Utah produced a $20 gold piece dated 1849.
Such pioneer gold issues circulated before federal double eagles became available.
Gold-mining regions often suffered severe shortages of federal coin.
Shipping raw gold thousands of miles to Philadelphia or New Orleans was slow, expensive, and risky.
Private firms and local operations converted gold dust into standardized pieces that could circulate more conveniently.
Once the United States Mint could efficiently turn large quantities of bullion into $20 pieces, the government gained a powerful tool for absorbing western gold.
The denomination was ideal for banks, international trade, reserves, and large transfers.
Twenty dollars in 1850 represented a substantial sum.
For many workers, it could equal weeks of wages.
Double eagles were therefore not primarily pocket-change coins.
They moved through banks, commercial channels, bullion transactions, and international finance.
Longacre's Liberty Head design, once modified into practical form, remained the basic double eagle type for more than half a century.
It was struck from 1850 through 1907.
During that span, the reverse underwent several modifications, including the addition of “IN GOD WE TRUST” and later changes to the denomination inscription.
As the United States expanded westward, additional Mints struck double eagles.
San Francisco began producing them after its opening in the 1850s.
Carson City later struck double eagles from Nevada gold.
The denomination became intimately connected with western mining history.
Double eagles were frequently transported in large quantities by ship.
Some shipments ended in famous maritime disasters.
Recovery of gold coins from wrecks such as the SS Central America has provided dramatic windows into nineteenth-century commerce and preserved remarkable Mint State examples.
The Civil War Era
During the Civil War, double eagles remained important stores of value even as specie disappeared from ordinary circulation in much of the country.
Gold coins could command premiums over paper currency.
The denomination reflected the complex relationship between metallic money and wartime finance.
In 1907, President Theodore Roosevelt's campaign to beautify American coinage brought the Liberty Head double eagle era to an end.
Sculptor Augustus Saint-Gaudens created a dramatically different $20 gold coin featuring a full-length Liberty and a flying eagle.
The Saint-Gaudens double eagle became one of the most celebrated American coin designs.
Saint-Gaudens' artistic triumph can sometimes overshadow the origin of the $20 denomination itself.
The double eagle existed because of the economic transformation caused by the Gold Rush.
Longacre's difficult 1849 experiment created the technical foundation for more than eight decades of federal $20 gold coinage.
Double eagle production continued through 1933.
That final year produced one of the most famous rarities in world numismatics after the United States abandoned ordinary gold-coin circulation and nearly all 1933 double eagles were melted.
The denomination's history therefore stretches from one legendary rarity in 1849 to another in 1933.
The unique 1849 pattern and the famous 1933 Saint-Gaudens double eagles form remarkable historical bookends.
The first represents the Gold Rush and expansion of federal gold coinage.
The second represents the end of the nation's circulating gold-coin era.
The surviving 1849 double eagle belongs to the National Numismatic Collection at the Smithsonian's National Museum of American History.
Its institutional home is fitting.
The coin is more than a rarity; it is a national artifact documenting the creation of a new denomination.
Because the surviving coin is part of the national collection, it has no meaningful current auction price.
Any attempt to assign a market value would be speculative.
If a second genuine 1849 gold double eagle ever appeared, however, it would instantly rank among the most important discoveries in American numismatic history.
The possibility that another example once existed gives the story an irresistible mystery.
Was it melted?
Was it lost?
Does it survive unidentified in an old collection?
No confirmed answer has emerged.
Longacre's Struggle Was Ultimately Successful
The December failure could have ended Longacre's double eagle design.
Instead, he revised it.
The resulting 1850 issue proved practical enough for mass production and durable enough to remain in service for decades.
The troublesome 1849 pattern was therefore not a dead end but a prototype.
The episode offers a valuable lesson about Mint history.
Successful coins often emerge through failed dies, rejected models, production tests, and engineering compromises.
Collectors usually encounter only the finished product.
Patterns reveal the experimentation behind it.
The December correspondence provides an unusually clear example.
A heavy hand press could force the 1849 design into metal.
The normal steam press could not produce it satisfactorily without unacceptable pressure.
The difference between those two outcomes separated a spectacular specimen from a viable circulating coin.
December 22 is especially valuable for a historical calendar because the event is anchored by contemporary Mint correspondence.
Patterson's dated letter to Meredith describes the enclosed double eagle and asks for rapid approval.
This is not a date inferred from a catalog or assigned retrospectively.
It comes from the officials directly responsible for creating the coin.
On December 22, 1849, Mint Director Robert Patterson sent Treasury Secretary William Meredith an experimental $20 double eagle and asked for his judgment.
The coin represented the federal government's first physical attempt to create a denomination authorized only nine months earlier in response to the California Gold Rush.
Within days, Mint officials discovered that Longacre's high-relief obverse could not be struck successfully by the ordinary steam-press process.
Regular production therefore had to wait until 1850.
At least two experimental 1849 gold pieces appear to have been made. Only one is known today, preserved in the Smithsonian Institution.
From that difficult beginning came a denomination that would carry California gold, cross oceans, fill bank vaults, survive shipwrecks, and eventually inspire Augustus Saint-Gaudens' masterpiece.
The double eagle's extraordinary history began with an experimental coin and an urgent letter dated December 22, 1849.
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