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Coins/ Quarters / Early Quarters/ 1823/2
FINENESS .8924ASW 0.19336 OZT6.74 G
OverviewHistoryVarietiesKey DatesCollectingChecklistReferences
Issue RecordKEY DATEPhiladelphia89.24% Silver1 of 32 issues

1823/2 Capped Bust, large size Quarter

The rarest circulating coin in the series, from the one delivery figure where record and trade agree exactly: 17,800 in calendar 1823, all from a single obverse die overdated from 1822. PCGS estimates 33 survivors and none Uncirculated — roughly 0.19% of the delivery, the lowest rate in the series, and a rate this reference cannot explain: at the series average near 1% the date would have left about 180 coins. The received explanation, Browning's melting hypothesis, rests on a mintage figure that is wrong by a factor of 6.6. And a census of this coin was being kept by letter in December 1867 — twenty years before the famous 1804-dollar census — per a PCGS note that is single-source and flagged as such. Auction record $246,750, AU58, Stack's Bowers, May 2015.

1823/2 · Capped Bust, large size Quarter
1823/2Photography pending
02

The numbers, and what kind of numbers they are

Every figure carries its evidence class. Press a class to open the record behind it — what it rests on, by what method, and what the series says you should not conclude from it.

RECORDED DELIVERY
17,800
The Mint recorded what the Chief Coiner DELIVERED in a calendar year, not what it struck bearing a date. Where the registry combines years, the split is a reconstruction and the class says so.
DATED ATTRIBUTION
17,800
What the trade assigns to coins bearing this date. A modern allocation by an outside authority, not a federal record.
ESTIMATED SURVIVORS
33
An estimate of how many still exist in any grade, not a count of coins anyone has seen. Every issue in this series carries one, which is not true of any other series here.
DIE MARRIAGES
1
How many obverse/reverse die pairings are catalogued for this issue. A marriage is a distinct pair of hand-cut dies, which is what makes these coins collectable by variety rather than by date alone.
03

Specifications

SpecificationValue
DENOMINATIONQuarter
DESIGNERRobert Scot (Draped Bust obverse, Small Eagle and Heraldic Eagle reverses) · John Reich (Capped Bust)
COMPOSITION89.24% silver, 10.76% copper — 92 13/16 grains of pure silver in 104 grains of standard silver
WEIGHT6.74 g
SILVER CONTENT0.19336 ozt
DIAMETERNot fixed by statute — which is the point of 1831. The Act of April 2, 1792 specifies weight and fineness and says nothing about diameter, so when the Mint reduced the quarter's diameter and thickened the planchet in 1831 it needed no legislation, passed none, and left no document explaining the decision.
EDGEReeded
MINTPhiladelphia only — the branch mints opened in 1838 and the first branch-mint quarter is the 1840-O
MINT MARKNone. No early quarter carries a mint mark.
DIE MARRIAGES1 — a single obverse die, overdated from 1822
04

The primary record

Every document behind the figures above. Where OunceDesk holds a copy, the row opens it.

Report of the Director of the Mint for calendar 1823
Held in the Archive · behind recorded delivery
PCGS CoinFacts — Draped Bust and Capped Bust quarter categories and ~30 major-variety pages
External authority — not held by OunceDesk · behind dated attribution
OunceDeskPrecious Metals IntelligenceIndependent research, market data, tools and coin intelligence for people who take hard assets seriously.

Hard Money. Hard Numbers. · Not investment advice. Some links pay us a commission — disclosures. Affiliate economics never determine research conclusions or rankings. © 2026 OunceDesk. Every figure classed OBSERVED / DERIVED / ESTIMATED / SPECULATIVE.