10 Centimes

Annonay, an industrial town in the Ardèche, issued emergency coinage in 1918 under the same pressures that drove hundreds of French communes to produce their own *monnaie de nécessité* during the war — the near-total disappearance of small bronze and copper coinage hoarded by a population with little confidence in the government's ability to supply it. Aluminium was the practical substitute, cheap and available, though coins struck in it wore badly and were often refused by merchants who found them too light to take seriously.