Remarkable 1867-S Liberty Head Half Eagle Stuns Submitter with Grade, Potential Value

The numismatic world is full of happy surprises and incredible discoveries, with one such case having recently passed through the PCGS Grading Room. The coin? An 1867-S Liberty Head Half Eagle – a coin that may look similar to many other vintage, but nevertheless relatively common 19th-century Liberty Head Half Eagles. However, the secret behind many 19th-century gold coins is that even those that may seem plentiful enough are remarkably scarce, even rare in any grade. That’s certainly the case with the 1867-S Liberty Head Half Eagle that Michael Precht recently submitted to PCGS for grading. It has a respectable mintage of 29,000, yet only 75 survive across the grading spectrum. And the one that Precht submitted? In the grade it achieved, it has a population of just one – the one he submitted.

“The coin was found in an estate in Buda, Texas, that I was asked to help liquidate for the heirs,” says Precht. “The coin originated from family members from Columbus, Ohio. The great-grandfather of this family was a Union soldier, discharged from the Union Army, in 1865 and it is believed that it was his coin because it was found in a cigar box with many other silver coins of similar dates. This small collection was passed down two generations in the family until it ended up in the current estate.

Precht says that while liquidating this estate, he found a green milk crate with this cigar box along with other more recent coins including two shoe boxes of Lincoln Wheat Cent rolls. “The milk crate was found in the corner of a bedroom closet. I brought the crate back to my home in the Dallas-Fort Worth Area and, after several months, I took the coin collection to a coin shop in Fort Worth where I left the collection for him to look through. After a few days, I received a call with him showing an interest in the gold coin, suggesting we might want to get it graded.”

Why did Precht choose to submit the coin to PCGS? “I have friends who are coin collectors and they have always spoken so highly of PCGS and how highly respected that grading service is.” Yet, even though he was compelled to submit the coin for grading, he wasn’t sure what to expect with the outcome. “I really didn’t know how [the coin] would be graded, but I did have a sense that it looked a lot better than average.”

In fact, he didn’t find out the coin’s grade or its potential value until the 1867-S Half Eagle returned in the mail. “I waited for the package to arrive and signed for it,” Precht recalls. “When I opened it, I was stunned. But even then, I had no idea of the value. Customer service told me that this coin falls into a rare category and that it could be very valuable.”

The 1867-S Liberty Head Half Eagle that Precht submitted earned a grade of PCGS MS63, throning it as the finest specimen known for that issue. The next-finest known, grading PCGS MS61, has a PCGS Price Guide value of $85,000. In MS63? Who knows… It’s the first 1867-S Liberty Head Half Eagle to achieve a grade of PCGS MS63!

According to Precht, it is the heirs’ wishes to place the coin for sale at auction. That debut offering will be in Heritage Auctions’ October 7-9, 2026, GACC Signature® Auction, where the new finest-known 1867-S Liberty Head Half Eagle will be prominently featured. “The find is remarkable,” says Heritage Auctions Chief Numismatic Cataloger Zeke Wischer. “It’s stories like this that remind us what might still be out there, long forgotten in a box that’s still being passed down from generation to generation. I think for all of us collectors there is a passion that burns a little brighter every time a discovery is made, especially when it is a coin as important as this 1867-S half eagle. Heritage is honored to present this coin for the family in its first auction appearance.”

As for Precht, his experience with PCGS left him “very impressed with [...] how they handled this coin’s grading process.” Adds Precht, who has an eye for vintage United States gold coins, “I’ve always loved the Saint-Gaudens gold coins and have several. This experience has made me interested in acquiring more of them and sending them in to be graded by PCGS.”