Japanese? Chinese? what is it? can anyone please inform me on what this bill is? year, and what its worth? Iv'e seen plenty of them on eBay and other site but NON of them have the same back as this note. Thanks in advance:thumb:
The face appears to be a genuine Bank of Japan 10 yen note, of a style issued from December 15, 1943 to March 2, 1946, known as the "Second Wake" series. Genuine notes are 81mm x 142mm. I can't determine from the picture whether you have a genuine note that has had the ink washed off the back in order to print an anti-government tirade about high taxes being wasted, or a propaganda piece with a copy of a banknote on one side, but if I had to guess, I'd say it's the former. (The various tears and folds have me convinced that the pictures really are of the same piece of paper.) The three-character line at the far right is "go sen en", meaning "5,000 yen". The remaining text criticizes the military spending. My Beautiful Bride, who was a teenager in Northeastern Japan when that note was in circulation during, and for several months following, World War II, had never heard of a seditious group such as the one which is apparently responsible for creating this unusual piece of propaganda, but the Kompetai (Japanese secret police of the time) were very efficient at preventing the spread of such activities.
It is a propoganda note prepared by the Allies. There were four different messages on the backs. They were airdropped over Japan during the war by the US Army Air Corps.
Well, that explains both the quality of the obverse and the source of the criticism of the government in a tightly controlled state. Do you know of a website that discusses them?
Thanks for the info. I was absolutely clueless about this. Can someone please translate the back word for word? also, how rare are these bills and what do you figure the value to be? Thank you for the information and help
Since You guys are the experts can I get some info about this note as well? I have a few more notes that I know nothing about that were handed down to me by a family member that was a government employee that traveled and collected notes from around the world Between 1939-1945
50 sen government note depicting Mt. Fuji and cherry blossoms, known as the "Fuji-Sakura" issue. Issued from June 3, Showa 13 (1938) to August 31, Showa 23 (1948), one of a very small number of notes issued directly by the government instead of the Nihon Ginko (Bank of Japan). In that condition the Japanese Numismatic Dealers Assn. 2012 catalog lists it a 200 yen (>$3). (100 sen = 1 yen)
Its on the webpage at lettow's link. They show up on ebay once in a while, but they don't go for very much.
