1841-D $5 Tall D (Regular Strike)

Doug Winter: The 1841-D half eagle is one of the more available Dahlonega half eagles from the 1840’s in high grades.

The 1841-D half eagle is a relatively easy issue to obtain in lower grades and it is more available in high grades than other dates of this era. Despite their occasional availability, Uncirculated examples are still highly prized and very desirable.

STRIKE: This is a better struck issue than either the 1839-D or the 1840-D half eagles. The obverse shows a fairly good strike with both the hair and the stars sharp. There is sometimes a slightly convex appearance to the obverse and, interestingly, the reverse does not appear concave. This gives the appearance of the two sides appearing slightly mismatched. The reverse shows good detail except for the eagle’s right leg and the tops of the arrow feathers which can be weak.

SURFACES: Many have medium to heavy abrasions on their surfaces. It is not unusual for an example to have mint-made planchet faults or small areas of granularity.

LUSTER: The 1841-D half eagle has above-average luster for a Dahlonega half eagle from this era. High grade pieces typically show good luster with a frosty, somewhat reflective texture. A few are known that have reflective, semi-prooflike fields.

COLORATION: A wide range of colors have been seen on uncleaned, original examples. Some have a pleasing medium to deep orange-gold coloration while others have a lighter greenish-gold hue. This issue has become harder to locate with original coloration since the first edition of this book was released as a result for the current disregard for originality by all but a handful of specialists.

EYE APPEAL: This date can be found with very good eye appeal. A number of very choice, original high grade pieces exist and they traded with some regularity in the mid to late 1990’s. Most of these have now found homes in private collections and are off the market.

PERSONAL OBSERVATIONS: The finest known 1841-D half eagle is a superb PCGS grade4d Mint State-65 that first surfaced in Stack’s October 1994 sale of the James Stack collection. It sold for $88,000 at that sale which was, to the best of my knowledge, and auction record for any Dahlonega gold coin at the time.

DIE VARIETIES: Three die varieties are known.

Variety 5-B: Tall D (sometimes referred to as "Medium D"). All varieties of this date have a similar obverse. On this die, the date is well-centered in the field. The reverse die is the same as on 1940 with a Tall D mintmark. The mintmark is positioned close to the feather and the upright is below the left edge of the tip of the feather and it is positioned above the left serif of the right diagonal of the V in FIVE. The right edge of the mintmark extends to the upright of the E in FIVE. According to Walter Breen, a total of 4,105 of the Medium D 1841-D half eagles were struck in two small production runs early in 1841.

This is a rare and important variety which deserves to sell for a significant premium over variety 5-D.

Variety 5-D: Small D

Variety 6-D: Small D

Gordon Wrubel: The Tall D $5. has a large D mint mark that is the SAME size as the D in the denomination, "FIVE D". This is distinguishable from the Small D whose mint mark is about HALF the size of the denomination D.