Great Britain. - 3 banknotes 1931-1938 - All white notes "Operation Bernhard" - various dates

10 pounds 18 April 1934. London. Signature: Peppiatt. P336a.
10 pounds 16 April 1935. London. Signature: Peppiatt. P336a.
20 pounds 7 June 1937. London. Signature: Peppiatt. P337a.

Operation Bernhard Banknotes or Bernhards as they are commonly referred to were produced by approximately 150 'volunteers', who were in fact, Polish and Jewish prisoners in Block 19 of Sachsenhausen concentration camp. The Nazis produced vast quantities of counterfeit English white Banknotes, overseen by Staatssckreiner (Chief of Police of the General Government) Friederich Walter Bernhard Krueger. The Nazis wanted to undermine the British Economy by air dropping the banknotes over Britain, but, they abandoned this idea in favour of the more subtle approach of buying goods and materials in neutral countries, also paying their spies and agents with them - the most notable spy being 'Cicero'. In 1945 the Nazis tried to hide the evidence of Operation Bernhard in the Enns River, the Traun River and Lake Toplitzsee, the latter is from where some of the banknotes in today's collections were recovered.