3 Pfennig - Frederick Francis

Wismar's municipal coinage authority survived well into the nineteenth century as an administrative curiosity — the city had passed to Mecklenburg-Schwerin by formal treaty in 1803, ending Swedish suzerainty that had lasted since 1648, yet continued issuing coins under local authority for decades afterward. The "Frederick Francis" designation ties this piece to Grand Duke Frederick Francis I of Mecklenburg-Schwerin, under whose nominal overlordship the city finally reconciled its tangled sovereignty.

By 1835, German small copper coinage of this denomination was already being squeezed out by monetary rationalization pressures that would accelerate dramatically after 1838 with the Dresden Convention.