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25 Cents Fort Plain Bank
| Issuer | Fort Plain Bank (Shearer & Cronkhite), Fort Plain, NY |
|---|---|
| Year | 1862 |
| Type | Vouchers |
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| Obverse description | At left, an engraved vignette of a standing female figure leaning against a tall classical column with a building visible in the background. Centre carries the issuer name within a decorative oval cartouche, with the denomination numeral '25' enclosed in a ruled circle at upper right. The obligation text and place-date line appear in letterpress below. |
|---|---|
| Obverse lettering | SHEARER & CRONKHITE, CANAL ST FORT PLAIN BANK PAY TO THE BEARER TWENTY FIVE CENTS When presented in Sums of ONE DOLLAR. FORT PLAIN, N.Y. Oct. 18th 1862 |
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| Comments |
Fort Plain Bank operated under the private ownership of Shearer & Cronkhite, a partnership arrangement common among small upstate New York mercantile firms that briefly entered note-issuing during the fractional currency shortage of the early Civil War years. Federal coin hoarding began almost immediately after Fort Sumter, and by mid-1862 small-denomination silver had essentially vanished from everyday commerce across the North — creating the vacuum these merchant scrip issues were designed to fill.
C. Knickerbocker's Albany lithography shop handled a number of similar low-denomination notes for regional issuers during this period. The Fort Plain issue is short-lived by definition: federally issued Fractional Currency arrived later that same year, rapidly displacing private scrip of this kind.