5 Pounds Sterling

The African Banking Corporation was a British-chartered commercial bank operating across southern and eastern Africa, not a central or government institution — its right to issue notes derived from colonial banking ordinances, not from any treasury mandate. Bradbury Wilkinson printed for a substantial roster of colonial and private banks during this period, and the ABC was one of several such clients whose note designs were produced in London and shipped out to branch networks spanning Rhodesia, Natal, and the East African coast.

Private bank issues from this issuer are genuinely scarce in any grade. The ABC was absorbed into Barclays Bank (Dominion, Colonial and Overseas) in 1925, after which remaining stocks would have been called in and destroyed.