 1652 Massachusetts Bay Colony. Willow Tree Shilling. N.3-E, Cr.3-E. R-7. 69. 4 gns. Extremely Fine. The Noe Census #22 Coin. The Noe Plate Coin. The discovery coin for the Willow Tree type: as Noe reports, ''About 1865, Mr. Woodward began to notice peculiarities in what had been considered Oak Tree shillings until then, and we find in his Sixth Sale (item 2524) the following description: 'Oak Tree Shilling, 1652. The tree on this remarkable piece is quite unlike an oak, resembling more nearly a Palmetto tree. The legend on the obverse, is ''Masathset inn''; on the rev. New Glad Au Do Dom; probably unique.''' Noe goes on to say that two years later Woodward catalogued another specimen and said Joseph Mickley had named the tree a Willow. Noe credits Woodward with first noticing in print that Willow coins look different from Oaks and Mickely with coming up with the name ''Willow'' for the type.
The obverse and reverse are pale silver gray on the high points, deeper gray in the fields and the protected areas. On the obverse the tree is nearly complete, being just a little soft in the center while the peripheral legend is a jumble but is nearly fully legible. On the back the date has been jumbled and reads as if it were 16522 but the denomination is complete. The peripheral legend on this side has clearly been double struck (i.e., run through the rocker press twice) resulting in a jumble of letters which begin DODOM and continue on. There are a couple of light marks, two parallel ones on the obverse mirrored by similar ones on the reverse, which are clearly artifacts of the striking process and not later damage to the piece. The coin is not entirely round (unlike the remarkable piece in the preceding lot) but rather has an oval shape which is quite striking and unusual.
Described by Breen as ''Noe 22 (3-E); only three known, one of them in ANS, another in Yale University, so the one here offered for all practical purposes Unique. Fine or better; ex G.J. Bauer and originally in the Bache Collection No.2524 sold by W.E. Woodward in March 1865. This identical piece is the one first discovered (by Woodward) to be of different type from the Oak Tree coins and the one to whose obverse he first applied the name of 'Palmetto Tree' - see Noe The NE and Willow Tree Coinages of Mass. (Monograph 182), p.15. Ill. Noe Plate VI (not IV) and Enl. Pl. XII.'' Very rare: the cataloguer has seen only eight of these. This one is nicer than two of the three in the Stearns sale. There was no N.3-E in the Garrett, Picker, Roper, Norweb, Oechsner, or NN 48th, 59th and 60th Sales. Reverse E was a well engraved die with evenly spaced letters of mostly uniform size. It went together with obverse N.3 very nicely.
Ex Bache Collection (William E. Woodward, March 20, 1865, lot 2524); George J. Bauer, T. James Clarke, F.C.C. Boyd Collections.
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| Hammer Price: $160,000.00
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