50 Centimes - Vred

Vred is a small commune in the Nord département, and this emergency issue belongs to the chaotic wave of locally printed small-change tokens that appeared across northern France in the weeks following the German advance in late 1914. The national coinage had effectively vanished from circulation — hoarded immediately — and hundreds of municipalities scrambled to fill the gap with whatever their local printer could produce. Imprimerie E. Mathis in Marchiennes was the obvious choice for several communes in the Scarpe valley, and the official stamp is the only security measure distinguishing a valid note from a copy.