10 Dollars

The Southern Bank Note Company, operating out of New Orleans, was one of the few engraving firms in the South capable of producing currency at scale when the Confederacy began organizing its finances in 1861. The company had been supplying notes to Louisiana state banks for years before secession, which is why early Confederate issues have a distinctly professional finish compared to the improvised printings that followed as the war disrupted supply lines and forced the Treasury to rely on smaller, less equipped printers.

Pick #22 belongs to the first major wave of Confederate federal currency, printed before the Union naval blockade made quality paper and engraving materials increasingly difficult to source. Cotton paper was a deliberate choice — domestic, abundant, and harder to counterfeit on linen stock.