The Medallic History of the United States of America 1776-1876

by J. F. Loubat

To complete my undertaking, it was necessary not only to study the composition and history of all our national medals, but also to have plates of them engraved, which could only be done from the originals or copies, or, as a last resort, from casts.

My first step was to apply to the Mint in Philadelphia for bronze copies of all the medals. In 1855 the director of that establishment had been authorized by the Secretary of the Treasury, to strike from the original dies, copies of the medals for sale, as is the custom at the Paris Mint. But when he sought to avail himself of this authorization, it was discovered that many of the dies were missing. It was thought probable that those of the medals which had been struck in France during the War of Independence would be found there, and the French Government was communicated with, in 1861, in regard to the following: "Washington before Boston; General Wayne, for capture of Stony Point; Colonel Fleury, for same; Captain Stewart, for same; Major Lee, for capture of Paulus Hook; Colonel John Eager Howard, for Cowpens; Colonel William Washington, for same; Major-General Greene, for Eutaw Springs; Captain John Paul Jones, for capture of the Serapis by the Bonhomme Richard."[13]

But the Paris Mint possessed only the dies of the two Washington, of the Howard, and of the John Paul Jones medals; moreover, the rules of that establishment did not permit them to be given up. Bronze copies of the four were obtained, however, and from them Messrs. George Eckfeldt and R. Jefferson of the Philadelphia Mint cut new dies.

In Washington, in January, 1872, I was informed by Mr. Spofford, of the Library of Congress, that after the fire which destroyed a portion of that library, December 24, 1851, the bronze copies of the medals formerly deposited there had been transferred to the Smithsonian Institution. At the latter place I was shown the remains of the collection, all more or less injured by fire. Moreover, the five wanted were not to be found; and further investigations made in December, 1877, in the Philadelphia Mint, showed that four of the dies, namely, those of Generals Greene and Wayne, and of Lieutenant-Colonel de Fleury and Major Stewart, are still missing from that establishment.

During the year 1872, I obtained permission from the Honorable Hamilton Fish, Secretary of State, to examine in the archives of his department the official papers relating to the medals of the War of Independence, and was fortunate enough to find the correspondence concerning the Diplomatic medal between Jefferson, William Short, the Marquis de la Luzerne, and the Count de Moustier. Afterward, in the reports of the Massachusetts Historical Society (vol. vi., 3d series), I found a description which seemed to apply to this same medal. I then went to Philadelphia to see the writer of the description, Joshua Francis Fisher, Esq., but he was on his death-bed, and it was impossible to prosecute the inquiry. After his decease, I was informed that no medal of the kind described was contained in his collection.

In 1790, President Washington ordered two Diplomatic medals to be struck and presented, one to the Marquis de la Luzerne, French Minister to the United States, and the other to his successor, the Count de Moustier. In Paris, in 1874, I made application to the present heads of those families, the Count de Vibray[14] and the Marquis de Moustier,[15] for information concerning these medals; but no trace of the object of my search could be found among their family papers.

About this time, Mr. Charles I. Bushnell, of New York city, kindly sent me plaster casts of an obverse and of a reverse, in which I at once recognized the Diplomatic medal, but neither bore the signature of Dupré. Nevertheless, I had a plate engraved from them, hoping by its aid to find the original.

I then turned once more to M. Gatteaux, the son of M. Nicolas Marie Gatteaux, who had shown me, in 1868, in his house in the Rue de Lille, Paris, the wax model of the obverse of the medal of General Gates, and the designs for those of General Wayne and Major Stewart, but, the house having been burnt during the reign of the Commune in 1871, he could furnish no information, and I was as far as ever from discovering the original of this piece.

In 1876 I showed to M. Augustin Dumont, the celebrated sculptor,[16] and the godson of Augustin Dupré, the plate engraved from the plaster casts, and from him I learned that M. Narcisse Dupré, the son of Augustin, was still living in the south of France, at Montpellier. M. Dumont had given to M. Ponscarme, his pupil, now professor in the École des Beaux-Arts, the maquettes, or lead proofs, of many of Dupré's works. A few days later, M. Ponscarme showed me a maquette of the obverse of the Diplomatic medal, and at last M. Narcisse Dupré sent me a photograph of the reverse. I thus obtained proof of the correctness of the engraved plate.

While in Washington, in February, 1872, I was fortunate enough to find, in the office of Rear-Admiral Joseph Smith, then chief of the Bureau of Yards and Docks, in the Navy Department, where they were used as paperweights, the original dies of the medal voted to Commodore Edward Preble for his naval operations against Tripoli. I immediately brought this to the notice of the chief clerks of the Navy and of the Treasury Departments, and also to that of Captain (now Rear-Admiral) George H. Preble, a connection of the commodore's, and these dies are now where they belong, in the Mint in Philadelphia. Shortly afterward I was also instrumental in having restored to the mint the dies of the Vanderbilt medal, which were lying in the cellar of one of the New York city banks.