Catalog
50 Vestindiske Dalere St. Croix
| Issuer | Dansk Vestindisk Nationalbank (Danish West Indian National Bank) |
|---|---|
| Year | 1850 |
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| Currency | Daler (1849-1905) |
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| Obverse description | Light blue underprint. At left, a vignette of Mercury in an oval frame, balanced by a portrait of Zeus at right; the royal arms appear at lower center. The note carries multiple signature varieties and bilingual text in Danish and English. |
|---|---|
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| Reverse description | Light blue ground overall. At center, a large ornate guilloche cartouche with scrolling foliate arabesques flanking a bold numeral "50" in an oval surround. Below the cartouche, the bilingual denomination "Fiftÿ Dollars." appears in gothic script, with the Danish legend arched across the top margin. |
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| Comments |
The Dansk Vestindisk Nationalbank was established in 1837 specifically to serve the Danish colonial economy in the Caribbean — sugar, rum, and the trade networks that depended on both. By 1850 the plantation system was already in structural decline; Denmark had abolished the slave trade in its colonies in 1792 and emancipation followed in 1848, just two years before this note was issued. The labor disruption that followed made circulating currency simultaneously more necessary and harder to back with stable agricultural output.
The Vestindiske Daler was pegged to the Spanish dollar, not the Danish rigsdaler, reflecting how thoroughly Caribbean commerce operated outside Copenhagen's monetary orbit. Pick 5 is among the rarer survivors of this short-lived colonial issuer.