This frontier-era Half Eagle was not preserved in quantity at the time of issue. Rather, virtually all of the 36,400 pieces produced were placed into circulation, where they were either worn to grades below the XF level or lost. A limited number of XF coins, nonetheless, did manage to survive, along with an even smaller quantity of AU pieces. The 1872-S is equally as rare as the 1868-S, 1869-S, and 1871-S.