20 Francs red order number

This note belongs to the emergency series rushed into circulation in August 1914, days after Germany invaded Belgium. The Banque Nationale had already begun preparing contingency issues, but the speed of the German advance compressed the production timeline sharply — the "red order number" designation refers to the serial numbering applied in red ink, used to distinguish printings within this series as the bank scrambled to maintain an adequate note supply under occupation conditions.

Louis Titz designed several of the bank's pre-war issues, and Biet's engraving work was retained from earlier plates. Production remained in Brussels even after the city fell, though under increasingly constrained circumstances.