BOSTON (WHDH) - An ultra-rare New England colonial coin worth up to $1 million is set to sell at auction later this year following its discovery in 2016 and its identification in 2020.
The “New England Threepence” dates back to 1652, according to the auction company Stack’s Bowers Galleries. The soon-to-be-sold coin will be included in Stack’s Bowers’ November auction and is currently on display at the firm’s Boston gallery on State Street.
“Lots of coins get called important,” said Stack’s Bowers Galleries Director of Numismatic Americana John Kraljevich in a statement earlier this month. “It’s hard to imagine anything more important than the discovery of a famous rarity, part of the first series of American coins ever made, that actually allows a collector to own a previously unobtainable type.”
Stack’s Bowers said silversmiths John Hull and Robert Sanderson struck New England shillings, sixpence coins, and threepence coins at their Boston mint beginning in 1652.
More than 370 years later, Stack’s Bowers said only one New England threepence coin remains locked in the possession of the Massachusetts Historical Society. Yale University had a coin of its own before the coin was stolen.
Stack’s Bowers said the coin slated for auction in November was found in an antique cabinet in the Netherlands in 2016 and identified as an authentic New England threepence four years later. Stack’s Bowers traces the coin’s story to Boston’s Quincy family.
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