First Manx bank note could fetch £15k at auction

The first Manx Bank note ever to be issued is expected to fetch between £10,000 and £15,000 at an auction in London.

Issued in November 1882, the £1 note with serial number one is set to go on sale at Noonans Mayfair on 14 March.

Head of the banknotes department Andrew Pattison said he believed it was "the finest Isle of Man note in existence".

He said the imagery on it was "iconic", showing locations such as the Tower of Refuge that "everyone on the island knows and loves".

"The fact that it is serial number one of the issue is a remarkable bonus,” Mr Pattison said.

The lot will be featured in an auction of hundreds of British and Irish bank notes, which also includes notes from Jersey and Guernsey.

Mr Pattison said: "Nowadays a lot of number one notes are kept but back then it simply wasn’t done.

"The fact that it’s survived is amazing".

He said around 30,000 of the notes were issued between 1882 and 1900 and "no others have survived, as far as we're aware".

Praising the quality of the engraving, Mr Pattison said they had been created by Waterlow and Son, who were the "best printers in the world the time".

He said the vignettes on the reverse of locations, such as the Laxey Wheel and the Albert Tower in Ramsey, would have been commissioned especially and therefore "the amount of money they must have spent on designing and printing them is really quite incredible".

Although collectors from the island would be interested, there were "many others from further afield who collect notes from the British commonwealth", he said.

The successful bidder "could be from anywhere, we're really not sure where its going to go", he added.

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