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5 Centimes
| Issuer | Commune of Boufarik (Department of Alger) |
|---|---|
| Year | 1915 |
| Type | Log in to see details |
| Value | 5 Centimes (0.05) |
| Currency | Log in to see details |
| Composition | Log in to see details |
| Size | Log in to see details |
| Shape | Log in to see details |
| Printer | Log in to see details |
| Designer(s) | Log in to see details |
| Engraver(s) | Log in to see details |
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| Obverse description | Black letterpress text on pink cardboard, enclosed within a plain double-ruled rectangular border. The header reads 'Ville de Boufarik' across the top, with the denomination expressed twice — in words ('TICKET de CINQ Centimes') to the left and in numerals ('5 Centimes') to the right. Two lines of smaller text below state the note's exchangeability at the Municipal Cashier for Banque de l'Algérie banknotes, followed by the instruction to demand the municipal stamp. |
|---|---|
| Obverse lettering | Log in to see details |
| Reverse description | Log in to see details |
| Reverse lettering | Log in to see details |
| Signature(s) | Log in to see details |
| Protection type | Official stamp |
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| Comments |
Boufarik's 1915 emergency cardboard notes were a purely local response to the acute small-change shortage that swept French Algeria — and much of metropolitan France — in the opening year of the war. The Banque de France's inability to keep fractional coinage in circulation forced hundreds of municipalities and commercial bodies to print their own substitutes. Boufarik, a small colonial agricultural town in the Mitidja plain, turned to a local press rather than any established security printer.
The official stamp was the only authentication barrier between a legitimate note and a forgery — a thin line for a 5-centime piece of pink cardboard.