1 Franc - Chambre de Commerce de Sens 89

The Chambre de Commerce de Sens was among dozens of French regional chambers forced into emergency note issue after the outbreak of war in 1914 drained small-denomination coinage from circulation almost overnight. Hoarding and the demands of military pay stripped the supply of bronze and silver coins to the point where ordinary retail transactions became genuinely difficult. Chambers of commerce, municipalities, and cooperatives filled the gap with locally authorized bons de monnaie — a patchwork system that persisted in some departments well into the early 1920s.

Printed in Troyes by Imprimerie Nouvelle François E., roughly 150 kilometers from Sens itself. The watermark is the sole security measure — modest for fiduciary paper, but adequate given that these notes circulated in a narrow geographic area where forgery offered little advantage.