1 Pound Bank of Adelaide

The Bank of Adelaide was a relatively late entrant among South Australian private banks, established in 1865 and operating in a colony that had already seen several note-issuing institutions come and go. By the time this note was printed, the Australian banking system was approaching the catastrophic crisis of 1893, when a cascade of bank failures across the colonies forced temporary suspensions, including the Bank of Adelaide itself in May of that year — meaning notes dated 1893 may have circulated only briefly before the suspension interrupted normal business.

Bradbury Wilkinson's security printing was considered among the most technically rigorous available to colonial issuers at the time.