Crailsheim issued this iron notgeld piece in 1918 under the same emergency conditions that drove hundreds of German municipalities to produce their own small-denomination coinage — the wartime metals requisition had stripped copper and nickel from civilian minting almost entirely. Iron was the compromise material, cheap and available, though its susceptibility to corrosion means uncorroded survivors are genuinely scarcer than mintage figures might suggest.
Crailsheim issued this iron notgeld piece in 1918 under the same emergency conditions that drove hundreds of German municipalities to produce their own small-denomination coinage — the wartime metals requisition had stripped copper and nickel from civilian minting almost entirely. Iron was the compromise material, cheap and available, though its susceptibility to corrosion means uncorroded survivors are genuinely scarcer than mintage figures might suggest.