10 Dollars

Leggett, Keatinge & Ball operated out of Richmond and Columbia, and their work for the Confederate Treasury in 1861 was constrained from the start — Southern engravers lacked the technical sophistication of Northern firms like the American Bank Note Company, which the Confederacy could no longer access after secession. The result was notes more vulnerable to counterfeiting than either the Treasury or the public cared to admit.

Pick 23 belongs to the first sustained wave of Confederate paper, issued before the inflationary spiral that would eventually render the currency worthless. By war's end, a $10 Confederate note bought roughly a pound of butter — if a seller would take it at all.