Catalog
1 Gourde Treasury bond
| Issuer | Trésor Public d'Haïti |
|---|---|
| Year | 1915 |
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| Composition | Paper |
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|---|---|
| Obverse lettering | LIBERTE - EGALITE - FRATERNITE REPUBLIQUE D'HAITI SERIE A BON DU TRESOR UNE GOURDE Emis en vertu de l'Arrete du 22 Janvier 1915, Remboursable par la moitie des droits de douane disponibles or et gourdes, et par l'emission autorisee par la loi du 27 Decembre 1914. LE DELEGUE DES FINANCES LE DELEGUE DU TRESOR |
| Reverse description | The reverse is entirely filled with an elaborate guilloche lace-pattern border enclosing a central rectangular panel, with numeral 1 counters set within ornate frames at left and right. The central panel carries a single bold letterpress anti-counterfeiting warning legend. The overall design relies on fine lathe-work guilloche patterns as the primary decorative and security element. |
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| Comments |
Haiti's 1915 was a year of violent political collapse — six presidents in four years had ended with Vilbrun Guillaume Sam's assassination in July, and U.S. Marines landing within days. The Trésor Public issued this 1 Gourde bond under a government that effectively ceased to function as a sovereign authority within months of its printing. Whether this was issued before or after the July crisis places it in dramatically different political circumstances, and the record is not clean on that point.
Treasury bonds at this denomination were circulating substitutes, not investment instruments — the 1 Gourde face value put them in everyday transactional use at a moment when public confidence in any Haitian paper instrument was near its floor.