The Baltimore County union. [volume] (Towsontown, Md.) 1865-1909, 1885-08-15
COunterfeiting Money.
The Boston TrareIer.


lie there is probably no one thing so
dangerous as counterfeiting. Of late
this has been carried on quite extensive
ly in different parts of New England,
and in a number of instances the prin-
cipals have been arrested with all their
paraphernalia, convicted and sentenced
to penal institutions for various periods.
Thinking that the general public would
be interested in knowing how some of
the "queer" is coined and circulated,
a zfa0eler representative started out
with that end in view, and had the
good fortune to fall in with a govern
ment official connected with the Secret
Service Department, who has had many
years experience in apprehending
counterfeiters. When the writer an
nounced his mission the official readily
gave his consent to be interviewed, and
said:
Counterfeiting is practiced more ex-
tensively than is generally known. In
my official capacity my work has been
almost entirely confined to unearthing
counterfeiting places. 1t is almost i'm
possible for me to say to what extent
paper money is counterfeited. Strange
as it may seem, but one counterfeit $40
gold piece has ever been discovered,
and that was dated 1850. 1t was made
as follows:
"A GENUINE DOUBLE EAGLE
was sawed in two, one side being left
thicker than the other. AS much gold
as possible was then scooped out of the
thick side, and mixture of platinum
and some other metal substituted to
bring it up to the standard weight. 1t
is what is known as filled coin,' and
is worth from 81 to So. A $40 gold
piece filled the same way is worth from
So to $3.50. There are quite number
of $40 counterfeits. The dates of those
filled or counterfeited are I84I-47-4o-
55-61-75-7o and 80. The one consid-
cred the most dangerous is dated IS47.
The first counterfeit half-eagle, or five
dollar gold piece, that the Secret Ser
vice discovered was in 1850, and no
less than twenty-five have appeared
since then, some of them being abso-
lutely worthless, while others are worth
from S2.7o to S4.63 each. The ones
dated 1882 are the most skillfully exc
cuted counterfeits known. Gold pieces
are not counterfeited so much as silver
coins, for the reason that gold counter
felt coins are made from dies and not
cast. The manufacturers of the queer
must buy the gold, which requires of
course considerable capital, and the ma
chinery is not only expensive but of
such large proportions as to render it
liable to detection. In manufacturing
counterfeit silver dollars, most any in
genious mechanic can do that after
little experience. The recent capture
and conviction of gang of conterfeit-
ers in New Hampshire illustrates how
few things are required in
COMING THE QUEER.
The articles found in the house where
the counterfeiters made their spurious
money, were plaster of paris moldS of
genuine coin, britannia, block tin, lead
and silver wash. The men engage in
manufacturing these counterfeit silver
pieces stole the lead pipe and bought
in the neighborhood old britannia tea
pots, from which they got their metal,
and the block tin they purchased in
Boston. The writer was permitted to
examine twenty or twenty-five of these
mold and dies for manufacturing diff
ferent coins of the United States, and
they were found to be fine pieces of
workmanship. During the past year
new counterfeit silver pieces were dis
covered almost every other month. In
leather bag were about 200 or 900
silver dollars in the rough, that is be-
fore they had been finished up and made
ready for the market. They were made
in New England. A number of others
that had been finished, were shown, and
it was almost impossible to distinguish
the difference between the genuine and
the spurious coin, so finely were the
latter finished. They are detected by
their general appearance and their
weight. The weight test is the most
accurate and reliable, especially with
gold coin. The Treasury has set
maximum and minimum weights, which
distinguish the weight of all coins. For
example, the maximum of a twenty dol
lar gold piece is $40 grains and the
minimum 5I3.42 grains. The difference
is exactly one-half of one per cent,
the amount allowed by law.
A GREAT DEAL OF COIN
becomes light from natural causes, and
when they come into the hands of the
National Treasury they are sent to the
Mint and recoined, the government
bearing the loss. AS general thing
nothing smaller than $40 gold piece
is ever filled, though the smaller coins
are plugged, which is, perhaps, the most
common. A new process, however,
has taken the place of plugging, to a
great extent, and is called Sweating"
Some photographers are credited with
doing this kind of thing. The modus
operandi of this new process is to take
number of gold or silver pieces and
suspend them in some acid for few
moments and then withdraw them. By
using fresh coin considerable quantity
of metal is obtained without reducing
the weight of the piece to any great ex-
tent, and they are then passed off again
on the public. Sometimes as much as
fifty cents in value is taken from S.
gold piece, and as much as eighty cents
has been known to have been taken
from double eagle. Another way of
tampering with double eagles is to re-
move their rough edges and remill them.
Between fifty and eighty cents can be
obtained in this way from single coin,
and the difference is not perceptible to
the naked eye. Silver coin that is less
than the minimum weight is rejected
by the Treasury officials, and the own
ers are obliged to pass them if they can,
or sell them for bullion. Some un-
scrupulous brokers buy them for ship
ment to Canada, where maximum and