Bank of Pennsylvania

Revolutionary bank

The first Bank of Pennsylvania was organized on July 17, 1780 at the suggestion of Thomas Paine to fund provisions for the Continental Army. Citizens were urged to pledge state and continental money to the bank, and a total of £315,000 in depreciated money was raised. The organizers then proposed to Congress to supply the army with these funds, if Congress would reimburse them with interest. Congress agreed and posted security in the form of bills drawn on its foreign envoys. Robert Morris and Alexander Hamilton would later observe that this was not properly a bank, since it did not lend, but rather a purchasing agency on behalf of the government. It nonetheless provided critical support for the army following the disastrous Siege of Charleston. The bank continued purchases for a year and a half, ultimately giving way to the Bank of North America, and was wound down after the war in 1784.