195 
XXIX. ACCOUNT 
OF COPPER COINS, FOUND IN MEDFORD, MASSACHUSETTS ; 
Ina letter to Hon. John Quincy Adams, Esq. Corresponding Secretary 
of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences. 
By Rev. THADDEUS MASON HARRIS, r. a. a. 
ee 
Dorchester, Nov. 5, 1808. 
DEAR SIR, 
PERMIT me through you to make the following communication 
to the American Academy of Arts and Sciences. 
In the spring of the year 1787, as going from Cambridge to Mal- 
den, I passed some people at work on the highway in Medford, who, 
in widening the road, had removed a large flat stone, under which they 
found a number of square copper coins, to the quantity I should judge 
of about two quarts. I took several of them myself ; and on my re- 
turn mentioned the discovery to several of my friends, who procured 
more. 
I had hoped that a circumstance so. curious would have attracted 
more attention, and that some learned antiquarian would have com- 
municated to the public his observations upon the coin. As this has 
not been done, and lest the fact itself should be quite forgotten, I 
make this statement. 
The coins were mostly square ; but some of them of the shape 
and size of Fig. 15. The others are represented in Fig. 16. Fig. 
17 is the same magnified, with the exergue and the characters com- 
pleted by a comparison of several of the coins, on which the stamp was 
more regular and central. 
