WAR-TIME CURRENCY

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXXII, Issue 22197, 26 August 1935, Page 8

WAR-TIME CURRENCY

"BEN PRICE" NOTE MEMORY OF RABAUL DISCOVERY IN SYDNEY A 20-mark bank note issued on behalf of the Commonwealth by the Treasury at Rabaul in 1914, when the Australian Expeditionary Force was in possession of the former German territory, has been found in Sydney. The note was one of a series printed in remarkable circumstances and under the most difficult conditions. At the time of issue the Australian force found itself without funds. Authority was sent by wireless from Melbourne to print and circulate an issue of five-mark, 10-mark, and 20mark notes, payable in coin at the Treasury, Rabaul. Sergeant Ben Price was detailed to produce the issue. A party under him took possession of the German Treasury. The party found there a decrepit hand press and a miscellaneous collection of "pied" type, but not a scrap of paper. Amateur compositors set to work. A smeary brown solution was compounded to serve as printing fluid, the concoction consisting mainly of boot polish and scarlet writing ink. Foraging parties were then sent out to find supplies of paper. One man laboriously soaked the labels off a number of bully-beef tins, but the printing matter on the labels could not be erased. Eventually a quantity of Sydney Morning Herald newsprint and newspaper wrappers and envelopes and paper bags was collected. The printing of the notes was soon under way.

The unsuitable quality of the paper precluded a lengthy period of usefulness for the "Ben Price" notes. Even when handled carefully they split, crumpled, became unrecognisable, or were lost. As a result, the Commonwealth Treasury reaped a handsome profit. The principal use of these "flimsies" issued as pay to the soldiers, was as "stake-money" for the popular card game known as "vingt-et-un." Even natives scorned the soldiers' notes. It was due to the refusal of an inhabitant of Nauru to accept one 20mark note that it now survives in Sydney. Left behind by Captain Norrie as a tip, the note was sent by the Administrator to the Treasury at Habaul with a request that a German 20-mark note should be remitted in exchange. This "Ben Price" note was recently unearthed among a pile of old letters.