Russo-Asiatic Bank 3 Rubles banknote 1917, Chinese Eastern Railway - Harbin
Reverse: Steam passenger train at center (Locomotive "Lady Baltimore")
Printed by American Bank Note Company, New York.
Russo-Asiatic Bank - Chinese Eastern Railway
Harbin 1917
50 Kopeks 1 Ruble 3 Rubles 10 Rubles 100 Rubles
Chinese Eastern Railway
The Chinese Eastern Railway or CER (Russian: Китайско-Восточная железная дорога or КВЖД, Kitaysko-Vostochnaya Zheleznaya Doroga or KVZhD), also known as the Chinese Far East Railway and Manchurian Railway, is the historical name for a railway across Manchuria (northeastern China). The line was built by Imperial Russia using a concession from Qing China, and linked Chita with Vladivostok in the Russian Far East. The T-shaped line consisted of three branches: the western branch, now the Harbin–Manzhouli Railway, the eastern branch, now the Harbin–Suifenhe Railway, and the southern branch, now part of the Beijing–Harbin Railway, which intersected in Harbin. The railway and the concession, known as the Chinese Eastern Railway Zone, were administered from the city, which grew into a major rail hub.
The southern branch of the CER, known in the West as the South Manchuria Railway, became the locus and partial casus belli for the Russo-Japanese War, the 1929 Sino-Soviet Conflict, and the Second Sino-Japanese War. The Soviet Union handed the CER to the People's Republic of China in 1952.