Descendants of a noteworthy paper manufacturer unearthed his collection of rare 19th-century gold coins during a house clearance. The treasure was auctioned off in London, England, fetching over half a million dollars and rocking the coin-collecting world in the process.
The collection consisted of 13 gold coins in a custom box, a full United States proof set from the U.S. Mint, dated 1888, once belonging to John Robert Fletcher, a third-generation award-winning tissue paper manufacturer from Stoneclough, Manchester.
The late September auction, which was managed by London’s Spink & Son, marked the first sale of its kind, with collectors from both the UK and the United States in attendance.
Gregory Edmund, head of the coin department and senior auctioneer at Spink & Son, said in a statement: “For these precious 13 coins to have survived untouched in their original presentation box through two world wars, numerous economic crashes, and the great rigors of time, is truly remarkable, to do so within the care of the same family, absolutely unprecedented.
“Having journeyed across America over the summer in pursuit of their origins, I can tell you that every researcher I met with shared the same gobsmacked expression I had when I first opened their custom-made presentation box to reveal these extraordinary coins.” He added that the rare lot promised to rewrite several history books from the onset.
Researchers at the National Archives in Philadelphia have pieced together the story of the coins, which Fletcher purchased during a working visit to Philadelphia from the UK in 1888.
Fletcher was a specialist producer of anti-tarnish, anti-scratch tissue paper, which proved ideal for the protection of silverware amongst the jewelry quarters of Birmingham and Sheffield. His product caught the attention of U.S. Mint officials. The Mint had previously come under fire for poor quality control practices, so the superintendent was authorized to buy specialty tissue paper from Philadelphia to help protect their limited edition “proof” coins.
Fletcher secured the commission, and it was during this trip that he bought a set of proof coins for himself, directly from the Mint, for $46.
In February 1889, weeks after Fletcher’s return from the United States, his uncle, the family paper company’s managing director, was murdered in broad daylight in Manchester. Dubbed the Manchester Hansom Cab Murder, the mystery was solved expediently by Detective Chief Inspector Jerome Caminada, who is fabled to have inspired Sir Arthur Conan Doyle’s eponymous Sherlock Holmes, since both men are said to have imprisoned exactly 1,225 criminals.
The re-emergence of Fletcher’s rare coins has shed new light on this extraordinary family history. Edmund believes their connection to the origin story of one of the world’s most famous detectives renders these otherwise niche coins “extremely cool.”
Spink & Son auction house believes that only 30 of these proof sets could ever have been made, or sold, at the command of the superintendent of the U.S. Mint. Most sets were spent, lost, or divided during the Great Depression, or melted down after the Great Recall under President Roosevelt, who prohibited the private ownership of gold.
Allegedly, the chief cashier of the Bank of England, Frank May, requested a set in February 1889 but was turned down. Edmund said: “It’s not every day one can have the chance to own something that the Bank of England was officially denied!”
Since 1888, only three of the possible 30 minted coin sets have been recorded: one is on display at the Smithsonian Institution, a second was donated to the American Numismatic Society by the renowned financier John Pierrepoint Morgan, and a third set was separated in error in March 1976.
Fletcher’s, therefore, is the only intact and original 1888 proof set in private ownership.
