1850 P $5 gold found

Tom_in_CA

Gold Member
Mar 23, 2007
13,804
10,336
Salinas, CA
🥇 Banner finds
2
Detector(s) used
Explorer II, Compass 77b, Tesoro shadow X2
1850 Moffat private mint $5 gold found.

I know I can't get banner for this, since it's not my personal find.

Today a few buddies and I went and tried a worked out hammered "back-pocket" site of mine Central coast of CA. This spot had been a traveler stopping spot, where perhaps an adobe habitations of some sort existed in the Mexican period of CA (1840s). 10 or 12 Years ago when I first researched out this site, I had found some early seateds, a few reales, a few cache coins, some gilt buttons, an indian "tinkler", and Republic of Mexico buttons. And the other usual age indicators: pistol balls, lantern parts, gun parts, rivots, rimfires, etc... The site never particularly had many targets to begin with. And it eventually got the point where I would work for an hour just to get any more conductive targets of *any* sort from there. So I rarely ever go there anymore.

Today though, two buddies and I had a few hours to kill between hunt destinations. So for lack of anything better to do, we decided we'd go knock ourselves silly and see if any more targets could be eaked out of this place. My guest Jim Searcy from Fresno, started working a periphery zone (fairly far outside the habitation/iron zone). His first conductive target/signals was a crisp clear "40" signal on his MXT (with eliptical coil). Down about 3 to 4", he pulls up this nice 1850 P $5 gold. His first gold coin. Here it is, fresh out of the ground, a few hours ago. I'm trying to convince him to clean it with sandpaper, but .... for some reason .... he's not listening to me! haha

We worked for another hour or so, and the only other age indicators we had to show for ourselves, was 2 pistol balls, and a few rivots.

Anyhow, he deserves his 2 minutes of fame, for his md'rs "hole in one" holy-grail of finds! Congratz Jim!

2012_09_03_09.51.08.jpg


2012_09_03_09.51.23.jpg
 

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Upvote 7
Truly a BANNER!!!Gold coins surface quite a bit out here.....not Private mints,and not Moffats!!!
 

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Oh man, I dream of finding a coin like that, Congrats!!!!!
 

Nice! Yet to find a silver let alone a gold :)
 

Incredible, big congrats for the finder. Once in a life time find
 

Awesome find, don't clean it and if you must soppy water and soft tooth brush.:icon_thumright:
 

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....dont touch the surface with anything!!

He's on his way back to Fresno with it right now. He's going to use a dental water pick when he gets home. He'll send me the micro-photo shots, and I'll post them for y'all. Or else he'll post them under his own T'net acct.
 

Wow, what a nice find!!! It shows that you need to hunt the fringes.
 

Thanks for sharing that here Tom!! Hope to see you over the winter months!
 

Wow wow wow if it were yours this would be a banner
 

I know I can't get banner for this, since it's not my personal find.

Today a few buddies and I went and tried a worked out hammered "back-pocket" site of mine Central coast of CA. This spot had been a traveler stopping spot, where perhaps an adobe habitations of some sort existed in the Mexican period of CA (1840s). 10 or 12 Years ago when I first researched out this site, I had found some early seateds, a few reales, a few cache coins, some gilt buttons, an indian "tinkler", and Republic of Mexico buttons. And the other usual age indicators: pistol balls, lantern parts, gun parts, rivots, rimfires, etc... The site never particularly had many targets to begin with. And it eventually got the point where I would work for an hour just to get any more conductive targets of *any* sort from there. So I rarely ever go there anymore.

Today though, two buddies and I had a few hours to kill between hunt destinations. So for lack of anything better to do, we decided we'd go knock ourselves silly and see if any more targets could be eaked out of this place. My guest Jim Searcy from Fresno, started working a periphery zone (fairly far outside the habitation/iron zone). His first conductive target/signals was a crisp clear "40" signal on his MXT (with eliptical coil). Down about 3 to 4", he pulls up this nice 1850 P $5 gold. His first gold coin. Here it is, fresh out of the ground, a few hours ago. I'm trying to convince him to clean it with sandpaper, but .... for some reason .... he's not listening to me! haha

We worked for another hour or so, and the only other age indicators we had to show for ourselves, was 2 pistol balls, and a few rivots.

Anyhow, he deserves his 2 minutes of fame, for his md'rs "hole in one" holy-grail of finds! Congratz Jim!

2012_09_03_09.51.08.jpg


2012_09_03_09.51.23.jpg
OK I have a positive ID. According to Walter Breen's Complete Encyclopedia of U.S. and Colonial Coins, page 633: I beleive yours is Item#7785. See description below in image taken from his book.
And O, O yessssssssssss, fantastic find...........Rich

California Gold.jpg
 

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