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50 Dollars Traders Bank of Virginia
| Issuer | Traders Bank of the City of Richmond |
|---|---|
| Year | 1860-1865 |
| Type | Log in to see details |
| Value | 50 Dollars (50 USD) |
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| Composition | Log in to see details |
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| Obverse description | Intaglio-printed note in green on white paper with a decorative starburst guilloche border carrying the denomination FIFTY repeated along all edges. At center, a large allegorical vignette shows a seated female figure of Commerce or Liberty holding a sword and accompanied by a small child with scales, a harbor with sailing vessels visible in the background. To the left, a secondary vignette depicts field workers harvesting tobacco or cotton, while to the right a portrait vignette of a young woman with ringlets appears in an oval frame. Denomination numerals 50 appear in starburst cartouches at upper left and upper right, with script lettering WILL PAY flanking the central vignette, and the bold legend FIFTY DOLLARS in an ornate panel below center. |
|---|---|
| Obverse lettering | Log in to see details |
| Reverse description | Reverse is blank, without any printed design or lettering. |
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| Comments |
The Traders Bank of the City of Richmond was a short-lived institution, chartered in 1851 and operating through the Civil War years before collapsing with the Confederacy's financial system. This note falls squarely in that wartime window, when Virginia's chartered banks were simultaneously honoring their own obligations and being pressured to absorb Confederate Treasury issues — a dual-currency environment that put enormous strain on specie reserves.
American Bank Note Company printed this from New York, which means the plates were almost certainly engraved and delivered before Virginia's secession in April 1861. Once rail and postal links severed, Richmond banks could no longer reorder or alter their stock, so whatever had been printed and delivered before the break was what circulated for the duration.