1 Dollar

The Banque du Peuple was a Montreal cooperative bank founded largely by Patriote sympathizers in the immediate aftermath of the 1837–38 Lower Canada Rebellion — its very existence was a political act, designed to offer French-Canadian merchants and tradespeople an alternative to the anglophone commercial banks that dominated colonial credit. This note dates to the bank's first year of operation.

Durand & Co. engraved and printed for a number of early Canadian private banks during this period, working out of New York. The S-prefix in the Pick reference places this squarely in the speculative private bank category — redeemability in specie was always the question with such institutions, and the Banque du Peuple would eventually suspend payments more than once before its final collapse in 1895.