Hey everyone! I have this group of 19 CSA notes - an area admittedly not my specialty. I'm wondering if anyone would mind helping me out on them - any details (esp rarity, value, and whether any look counterfeit) would be greatly appreciated. I've taken photos of each note (front/back) and made a special page on my website to display them (since there are so many photos...) Here's the link: http://benjaminallen.org/csa In the meantime, I'm going to be researching them and trying to figure out what I can on my own. Please, please beat me to it! Thank you!
I have a reference at my house...I'll look them up once I get home unless someone beats me to it. Might be about 3 - 4 hours until I get there.
Thank you! I've done what I can to add info - I'll leave them as they are so it doesn't get confusing.
My wife gave me a book for Christmas about Confederate currency. But I haven't read it yet. I have just one CSA note and it is similar to your $20 note near the end of your list. Rob
@stldanceartist I'm using "Collecting Confederate Paper Money: Field Edition 2014" by Pierre Fricke (which by the way is a fantastic book). I don't have anything on the bonds. The first, $100 note is listed as T-40. Contemporary counterfeits were missing two trainmen. He says because these were interest bearing many were saved and high quality examples are easily found, however because of large production numbers many were not well cut. The stamps on the back indicate that the interest was paid. There are no major varieties for this note. Also, there's a group called the Trainmen who nerd out on these and they have a website www.csatrainmen.com I don't have anything on the Virgina/Richmond treasury notes. The next CSA note is listed as Type-36 (T-36), sailor to the left, commerce seated on a bale of cotton, issued from 31 Mar 1862 - 3 Jan 1863. Female figure represents Ceres, goddess of the Harvest seated on a bale of cotton, holding a caduceus in left hand with two serpents entwined. Sailor to lower left holding a telescope. Fricke says these are a common type in all grades except Choice Extremely Fine to Choice Unc. Your variety is from the second series and appears to be PF-4 (CR-278 is from another system) with a rarity rating of 2 or 50001 to 100000 known. The next CSA note is T-68 with horse drawn artillery at center and R.M.T. Hunter at lower right (he was Secretary of State for a brief period and Confederate Senator). This type has many varieties. This type may be found with light red/pink to darker red overprints, and the darker red commands a premium. The back comes in different shades of blue with the darkest commanding the strongest premiums. This type is common in all grades including Choice Unc. Scarce in Choice/Gem AU or Unc Red. I couldn't find a variety that matched your note (unless your back is inverted!). The last CSA note is a T-67 and similar to the T-68 can have shades of pink/red with red commanding a premium. No known contemporary counterfeits. At the center is the state capitol of Tennessee and at the lower right is Alexander Stephens, Vice President of the Confederacy. The reverse is blue. This type is common in all grades except Choice/Gem RED high grade. This one does not fall into any of the major varieties. As far as value & grading...I'm too new to paper to be much help, but hopefully you could peruse eBay/Heritage/etc. with this information and figure something out. If you would like to discuss varieties or get any other info, send me a PM and we'll talk. I hope this was at least a little helpful.
As noted most of those are bond coupons cut from the larger bonds. There are only 4 real CSA issued currency notes there, none are rare. The diffuse steam $100 is pretty rough... the blue backs are in decent shape but extremely common (the $10 was the most common CSA note ever printed). The T36 $5 CSA is also common. None are particularly valuable, maybe $25 for the nicest of them.
Those North Carolina and City of Richmond notes are all very common and in those conditions might bring $10 on a good day. The Corp. of Richmond one around $20.
The bond coupons represented twice-annual interest payments on CSA bonds. Since they were from bearer bonds, the coupons were often clipped off in advance and circulated as cash. The bonds would have some collector value, but coupons by themselves have very little.
