1850-O Half Dollar SS Republic - 1850-O 50C SS Republic Shiprwreck Effect, NGC. This Southern mint, 1850-O Liberty Seated half dollar comes with the provenance of the ill-fated SS Republic. The coins surfaces are gun-metal gray and silver-gray with the latter more prominent on the devices and the former in the fields. Surfaces abrasions are minimal, with none so serious to require individual description. The strike is above average, unlike many New Orleans Mint coins of the 1850s, with full details on the word LIBERTY and the lower left of the eagle.

During the California Gold Rush, the SS Republic, then called the Tennessee, was used to transport miners to the shore of Panama and Nicaragua to travel to the California gold fields. For several years the ship was used to carry immigrants to the Unites States from Mexico. When the Civil War began, the ship was docked in New Orleans. She was seized by the Confederates and used as a blockade runner. After the capture of New Orleans by the North, she became the flagship of Admiral Farragut for the end of the Mississippi Campaign. In 1864, she resumed transporting passengers and cargo from New York to New Orleans.

The next year she sank in a hurricane off the coast of Savannah. In 2003, the Odyssey Republic Expedition, after twelve years of searching, discovered and began the recovery of the ships treasure. The cargo had been untouched for 138 years approximately 100 miles off the coast of Georgia. Lost Gold of the Republic, a film produced by National Graphic, documents the discovery and recovery. The coins recovered from the SS Republic are labeled as such by NGC and its affiliate NCS not only to note the historic significance of the coins, but also to indicate that these coins have been professionally conserved. The blue NGC tag was used exclusively for coins from the Republic.

Christian Gobrecht designed the Seated Liberty half dollar. The obverse depicts Liberty seated looking over her shoulder to the left. She balances the Union Shield inscribed LIBERTY with her right hand and holds a staff on which is placed a Phrygian cap in her left. There are seven stars to the left and six to the right interrupted by her head and the capped pole. The date is below. The reverse shows the heraldic eagle looking left. It is surrounded by the required inscription and the denomination written as HALF DOL. below. Dentils are around the periphery of both sides of the coin.

To earn the Shipwreck designation from NGC, a coin must have been recovered in an archeologically sound way, according to procedures that ensure the history of the wreck. It is conserved using the least invasive means available to make sure that the surface is stable and preserved.