1 Fen Hunan-Hupeh-Kiangsi Soviet

The Hunan-Hupeh-Kiangsi Soviet was one of several short-lived Communist base areas established in central China during the early 1930s, operating under intense Nationalist military pressure from Chiang Kai-shek's encirclement campaigns. Local Soviet authorities issued their own coinage partly as a practical necessity and partly as a deliberate assertion of administrative legitimacy over the rural population under their control.

KM#1 for this issuer — a copper fen struck in 1931 — was produced under primitive conditions, and die quality varies considerably across surviving examples. The Soviet itself was effectively destroyed by 1934.