The Dix Noonan Webb Banknote Department held a live online auction of British, Irish and world notes on June 24. The sale was held online only because of the COVID-19 pandemic.

The unprecedented circumstances led the firm to donate a percentage of the 24 percent buyer’s fee to the National Health Service COVID-19 Urgent appeal. The auction raised the pound equivalent of $3,014, bringing the overall total raised so far to about $49,647.

Another philanthropic venture in the sale was the second part of the Charity Sale from the archive of the Allied Irish Banks, formerly the First Trust Bank. This group of Irish material raised $47,543 for the bank’s chosen charities: AgeNI, a charity for older people in Northern Ireland, and the Alzheimer’s Society, bringing the combined total from recent sales to $85,726.

There will be a third session in October.

One of the sale’s most publicized highlights was a very rare, About Uncirculated, canceled £1 million Treasury bill of Sept. 8, 2003, that sold for £4,400, or $5,493, well in line with its estimate.

All prices are without the buyer’s fee.

The auction opened with a collection of 36 Bank of England errors achieving nearly $12,500. Individually, some pieces sold for more than $500, what the firm characterizes as very high prices for notes of this kind.

The second part of the Yves Cataroche Collection of Guernsey Banknotes attracted considerable interest. A fine example of a rare and attractive £1 note dated 9TH FEBRUARY 1924 estimated at £1,000 to £1,500, sold for £4,200, or $5,243.

A Central Bank of Ireland £50 note dated 4 MAY 1954 called Very Fine in the catalog surpassed its £3,000 high estimate by £200, ending at $3,995.

A dozen lots of uncut sheets of proof notes were part of the Allied Irish Banks archive section. A Provincial Bank of Ireland Ltd. example of 24 £100 proofs from the 1981 issue, without serial numbers or date, and with color bars in the upper and lower margins, more than doubled its estimate when it was hammered down at $1,748.

Other strong areas were selections of notes from British East Africa, Russia, and German East Africa.

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