12 Groschen Siege of Erfurt

Erfurt was ceded to Napoleon in 1806 and administered as an imperial French possession until the collapse of the Grande Armée forced a renegotiation of central European boundaries. By 1813, with Prussian and allied forces pressing westward after Leipzig, the French garrison under General Lapoype found itself cut off and unable to access normal monetary channels. These siege notes — denominated in groschen rather than francs, a deliberate concession to local custom — were issued as emergency instruments to pay troops and procure supplies from a hostile civilian population.

The Erfurt siege lasted into late 1814, one of the longest French holdouts on German soil. Lapoype surrendered only after Napoleon's first abdication.