100 Francs - Bon municipal de la ville de Saint-Omer church right [62]

Saint-Omer issued these municipal bons in 1940 under German occupation, when the disruption of normal banking and the withdrawal of coin from circulation forced hundreds of French municipalities to produce their own emergency paper. The Pas-de-Calais département fell under a separate German military administration from the rest of occupied France — attached to the Brussels command rather than Paris — which added further complication to supply chains and official currency flows.

Loïez-Bataille was a local Saint-Omer printer, not a specialized security press, which is exactly what you'd expect given the circumstances. Vandenbergue's engraving work is the one element that elevates this above the purely functional.