In 1771 under an old giant Chestnut tree in Orange County North Carolina, a Captain Messer stood on the top of an empty whiskey barrel with the end of a hangman’s noose around his neck. He had clammed up about a missing British payroll gold shipment of British gold crowns refered to as "Half-ass George the Third". They were embossed only on one side and therefore referred too as, trace coins.
