Description and research notes
Complete archival proof set of five Sterling Traveller’s Cheques produced by Bradbury Wilkinson & Co., London, for the Bank of New South Wales in April 1961. The set comprises 2 Pounds, 5 Pounds, 10 Pounds, 20 Pounds, and 50 Pounds, each bearing the printer’s manuscript control notations and dated approval workflow marks from the same submission.
Across the set, the faces show the full engraved traveller’s cheque design used by the bank in the early 1960s: multitone intaglio guilloche backgrounds, denomination tablets at the corners, central payable text panels, and the Bank of New South Wales London address at 29 Threadneedle Street. Each sheet carries a single round control punch (lower left area) identifying these as internal proofs retained for numbering and layout verification rather than for circulation or distribution. Paper is high rag-content proof stock with visible grain and plate bite under angled light.
Shared front-margin annotations read “For numbering only” with a uniform submission date of 28.4.61. The 5 Pounds sheet adds the specific instruction “Seven figures without space again,” documenting a live test of seven-digit serial format and spacing. Serial placeholders and trial prefixes vary by denomination to demonstrate alignment and position. Tint palettes are denomination-specific (for example, violet to carmine on 2 Pounds; blue-green on 5 Pounds; green-yellow on 10 Pounds; mauve-violet on 20 Pounds; brown-olive on 50 Pounds), reflecting Bradbury Wilkinson’s mid-century colour separation for quick visual denomination recognition.
The 10 Pounds sheet serves as the master working proof in this group. It retains a perforated binding stub at the left edge, includes the printed facsimile signature placement on the face, and carries an additional small alphanumeric control mark at the upper right (noted here as B.20). On the reverse, a red handwritten approval line and date note the final layout sign-off on 29.4.61, one day after the “For numbering only” submission date seen on the set. Together these features identify the 10 Pounds as the supervisory approval piece that finalized signature placement, serial position, and layout for the series.
The 2 Pounds, 5 Pounds, 20 Pounds, and 50 Pounds sheets are companion numbering proofs from the same printer batch, each dated and inscribed in the same hand. Their consistent control punch position, matching paper stock, and synchronized margin notes confirm they were prepared together as a single production event. Minor pencil ticks and short-form filing codes appear on the margins, and the backs show light archival handling, consistent with Bradbury Wilkinson proof-room practice.
As a complete printer’s submission preserved intact, this set documents the last pre-decimal Sterling traveller’s cheque series prepared for the Bank of New South Wales immediately before Australia’s 1966 currency changeover. While single proof sheets occasionally survive, full denomination sets with synchronized dates and approval notes are virtually unknown; the survival of all five denominations together, including the 10 Pounds master approval proof with perforated stub and red reverse approval line, elevates this to a museum-level record of mid-century Australian security printing.