U.S. Mint coin reference
Obverse: Liberty faces right with loose, windblown hair. LIBERTY is placed above the portrait and 1793 below.
Reverse: A chain of fifteen interlocking links surrounds ONE CENT and the fraction 1/100. UNITED STATES OF AMERICA, abbreviated on one die, follows the border.
Chief Coiner Henry Voigt prepared the Chain cent dies for the first large-scale federal coins produced with the new Mint’s own machinery. Deliveries made in February and March 1793 totaled 36,103 pieces before the design was retired.
The linked chain was intended to represent the union of the states, but the reverse and Liberty portrait drew criticism. Mint officials answered quickly with the Wreath cent, making the Chain cent a brief opening chapter in federal copper coinage rather than a continuing series.
The earliest reverse abbreviates the country as AMERI. Later dies spell AMERICA, and one pairing places periods after LIBERTY and the date. These AMERI., AMERICA, and Periods distinctions, together with the associated obverse dies, define the principal Sheldon varieties of the type.