Catalog
1 Pound
| Issuer | Papuan Industries Ltd. |
|---|---|
| Year | 1906 |
| Type | Pattern or trial banknote |
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|---|---|
| Obverse lettering | ₤1 THEY SHOULD BEAT THEIR SWORDS INTO PRUNING HOOKS SHARES INTO PLOUGH AND THEIR SPEARS PAPUAN INDUSTRIES Ltd FAITH & WORKS PEACE GOODWILL THE PAPUAN INDUSTRIES Ltd. PAY THE SUM OF ONE POUND STERLING NEW GUINEA THIS ORDER IS PAYABLE AT THE OFFICES OF THE COMPANY AT MULGRAVE ISLAND AND SYDNEY OR AT THE QUEENSLAND NATIONAL BANK Ltd. THURSDAY ISLAND ISSUED DIRECTOR MANAGING DIRECTOR PAPUA OR NEW GUINEA Mulgrave Is. or Badu TORRES STRAIT Thursday Is. 1 ONE BRADBURY, WILKINSON & Co. Ld. ENGRAVERS LONDON |
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| Reverse lettering | CANCELLED |
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| Comments |
Papuan Industries Ltd. was a labour-recruiting and plantation enterprise operating in British New Guinea, and this 1 Pound note is among the rarest examples of private scrip issued in the Pacific — produced not by any government or colonial treasury, but by a commercial company to facilitate wages and internal transactions in a territory where coin was chronically scarce. Bradbury, Wilkinson produced it to the same technical standard they applied to sovereign currency, which makes the issuer's obscurity all the more striking.
Very few examples are known to have survived.