1862 $1 Large Size Legal Tender Note Fr-16C "The GreenBack" Grades g details. Series 1862 Legal Tender bills were the first Federally issued notes. They came to be nicknamed greenbacks for the color of the back . Head of Salmon P. Chase, Secretary of the Treasury under Abraham Lincoln,1861-1864, and Chief Justice of the U.S. Supreme Court 1864-1873. He is probably best known to numismatists for his causing the motto "In God We Trust" to be adopted for our national coinage.