5000 Francs

The Banque de l'Algérie operated under French metropolitan authority but found itself in an awkward administrative position after the Armistice of June 1940 — nominally under Vichy control, yet on territory that became the Allied operational base following the November 1942 landings. Notes of this series were issued into precisely that transition, circulating during one of the more politically unstable periods in Algerian monetary history. The 5000 Franc denomination was a high-value instrument, well beyond ordinary daily transactions.

Deloche was among the more technically accomplished engravers working at the Banque de France's in-house atelier during the interwar and wartime periods. Duval's design work for this series followed conventions established for French colonial-affiliated banks, though the execution by the Paris printer gives it a metropolitan quality that distinguishes it from purely colonial emergency issues of the same period.