20 Dollars = 5 Pounds

The Bank of Montreal's dual-denomination note — expressed simultaneously in dollars and pounds sterling — reflects the genuine monetary confusion of pre-Confederation Canada, where British pounds, American dollars, and various colonial currencies circulated in uneasy parallel. The equivalence of $20 to £5 was fixed at the rate of four dollars to the pound, a Halifax rating that colonial banks used as a practical anchor before Canada adopted decimal currency in 1858.

Rawdon, Wright, Hatch & Co. in New York were among the most technically accomplished bank note printers working in North America at the time, and the Bank of Montreal was one of their significant clients before the business eventually evolved into the American Bank Note Company in 1858.