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When the South seceded from the Union, they had no money so they had to create their own currency. These are actual Confederate Bills from 1864; note that they printed a 50 cent bill as well because they could not spare metal for coinage as they needed it for guns and ammunition.
Here are a few interesting tidbits of info about their currency. The $20 bill features the Tennessee State Capitol...it was completed in 1859 just before the Civil War began. Jefferson Davis, Confederate States one and only President, is featured on the $50 bill and General Stonewall Jackson is shown on the $500 bill. Note that the $100 bill features a "woman"; the only woman ever appearing on a bill printed in the United States, she is Lucy Holcombe Pickens from LaGrange, Tennessee (about 22 miles from Bolivar) ... she was the wife of the Governor of South Carolina pictured in the lower right corner. She was often referred to as the "Queen of the Confederacy".
As the war raged on, the South had fewer resources and began printing more and more money; toward the end of the war, the money became almost worthless! You might be curious to know what this Confederate money is worth today. To a collector, in very good condition, the $20 note featuring the Tennessee State capitol would go for about $50; the $50 note featuring Jefferson Davis would bring about $75; the $100 note with our neighbor Lucy Pickens would be worth about $125 and the $500 note of General Stonewall Jackson would be worth about face value or $500.
Now after the war was over in 1865, the southern states rejoined the Union and again were using the U.S. currency. Let's take a look to see how the value of U.S. currency has fared over the last 220 years...
The value of the U.S. dollar took a severe dip during the Civil War and then largely regained its value but as can been seen in the above chart after we left the gold standard and began printing "more and more" currency (red line on the right), the value of the dollar has dropped dramatically.
Perhaps a simplier way for us to understand this dilemma is to look at the Big Mac Chart below. In the last 14 years alone, the price of a Big Mac has almost doubled in price (84% increase) from $2.51 average price in 2000 to $4.62 average price in 2014.
The moral to this story is that governments should not be allowed to print an unlimited supply of money because it makes the money you currently have worth LESS! A lesson we should have learned from Jefferson Davis and Abraham Lincoln.
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