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| Issuer | Black Sea Railroad (Черноморская Железная Дорога) |
|---|---|
| Year | 1918 |
| Type | Local banknote |
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| Reverse description | Plain paper with a fine guilloche border frame enclosing three numbered paragraphs of text in Cyrillic script, setting out the conditions of acceptance and redemption of the bond at the cashier's office of the Black Sea Railroad Administration in exchange for credit notes, with a reference to the resolution of the Revolutionary Non-Party Committee of Workers' and Peasants' Deputies of 11 April 1918. A small printed number appears at lower right. |
| Reverse lettering | 1) Настоящие боны имѣютъ обязательное хожденіе по Сочинскому округу наравнѣ съ кредитными билетами, согласно постановленія Революціоннаго-Непартійнаго Комитета Рабочихъ и Крестьянскихъ Депутатовъ отъ 11 Апрѣля 1918 г. 2) Настоящіе боны имѣютъ хожденіе по 20 Октября 1918 г., до чего удержатъ свою силу, по истеченіи мѣсяца обмѣниваются, въ кассѣ Строительнаго Управленія Черноморской Желѣзной Дороги на кредитные билеты. 3) За подѣлку боновъ виновные подлежатъ отвѣтственности на основаніи дѣйствующаго закона. |
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| Comments |
The Black Sea Railroad operated in the Caucasus region and, like dozens of other regional enterprises and municipalities during the chaos of 1918, resorted to issuing its own scrip when Kerensky-era banknotes became scarce and the Bolshevik takeover shattered normal currency supply channels. These emergency transport company notes — known collectively as bony — were technically obligations against future redemption rather than conventional banknotes, a legal fiction that gave issuers plausible cover.
Survival rates for regional Russian Civil War scrip vary wildly; many issues were repudiated outright and bulk quantities were never redeemed, yet others disappeared entirely through destruction. The Black Sea Railroad series sits somewhere in between — not genuinely rare, but not common in collectible condition either, as the paper quality used by provincial issuers in this period was rarely archival grade.