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| Issuer | Board of Commissioners of Currency, Malaya |
|---|---|
| Year | 1941 |
| Type | Standard circulation banknote |
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| Obverse description | Intaglio portrait of King George VI in military uniform within an oval vignette at left, set against a fine guilloche underprint in ochre and brown. The large numeral '1' in an ornate lathe-work cartouche occupies the right side, with the denomination 'ONE CENT' in bold letterpress at centre. Date '1ST JULY 1941' appears below the central text, with Jawi script inscription and the Chairman's facsimile signature at lower right; the printer's imprint runs along the bottom margin. |
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| Reverse description | Reverse entirely unprinted, left plain without any design, text, or ornamentation, consistent with the wartime economy issue format for this low-denomination note. |
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| Comments |
The Board of Commissioners of Currency was a joint body established in 1897 to serve the Federated Malay States and the Straits Settlements — a currency union of sorts long before that phrase had any political weight. By 1941 it also covered the Unfederated Malay States and British Borneo. This 1 Cent note belongs to a low-denomination paper series introduced partly because the small-change coin supply had become chronically inadequate across the scattered territories.
Japanese forces overran Malaya between December 1941 and February 1942. The Board's notes were swiftly displaced by Japanese Military Administration currency, and large quantities of the 1941 issue were destroyed or abandoned during the retreat. J. Hubner was the Currency Commissioner whose signature appears on this series.