1861 Eagle - 1861 Eagle NGC AU55 - 1861 $10 NGC AU55. Here is an opportunity to acquire an authentic, certified Civil War era artifact. This 1861 gold eagle is in Choice Almost Uncirculated condition and still retains some of its original mint luster. The coin shows little actual wear, except for its highest points. The surfaces are original and have never been cleaned. They show abrasion marks, in keeping with the grade. None of the marks is so individually distracting that it merits description. The surfaces are a mixture of yellow and greenish-gold, which is typical for the time. The coin is well struck with full details on the centers of the stars, Libertys hair, the eagles neck, its shield, and the area to the lower left of the shield.

Designed by Christian Gobrecht, the Liberty Head eagle shows Liberty facing left in profile wearing a LIBERTY inscribed coronet with her hair tied in the back in beads. Two long curls hang down her neck, one in the back and the other on the side. She is surrounded with thirteen six-pointed stars. The date is below the truncation, which shows no drapery. The motif is taken from a Benjamin West painting of Venus. It was also used with modifications for the Large Cents of 1839. The reverse shows a heraldic eagle with outstretched wing looking to the left. On its chest is the Union shield. In its talons it holds the olive branch and arrows. The error in the previous issue, Scots eagle held the arrows and the olive branches in the wrong talons, is corrected. Except for being interrupted by the tips of the eagles wings UNITED STATES OF AMERICA surrounds the reverse, separated from the denomination TEN D. by dots. Dentils are near the edge on both sides of the coin, and the edge is reeded.

In 1859 Engraver Longacre prepared a new reverse that was used on Philadelphia coins until 1865. On them the eagles claws are thinner and shorter. This change is not seen on the branch mint coins because they were using 1857-1858 dies.

Gobrecht became the third Chief Engraver at the United States Mint. He was born in Hanover, Pennsylvania in 1785. His father was a German immigrant, and his mother traced her ancestry to the early settlers of Plymouth, Massachusetts. Gobrecht married Mary Hewes in 1818. One of his early positions was as an engraver of clocks in Baltimore. Later he went to Philadelphia where he became a banknote engraver. He invented a machine that allowed one to convert a three-dimensional medal into an illustration. In 1826 Gobrecht did his first work for the Mint as an assistant to William Kneass. After Kneass suffered a debilitating stroke, Gobrecht did all the die and pattern work for the Mint. He became Chief Engraver in 1840 and served until his death in 1844. He was famous for his Liberty Seated motif, which was used for all denominations of silver coinage including the half-dime, dime, quarter dollar, half dollar and silver dollar. He also designed the Liberty Head gold eagle, a motif that was also used on the half-cent, the cent, the gold quarter eagle, and the gold half eagle.