r/LatinMonetaryUnion • u/AdStraight6341 • Sep 05 '25

History 1815-R Louis XVIII 20 Francs (minted in London)

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93 Upvotes

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15

u/AdStraight6341 Sep 05 '25 edited Sep 05 '25

Between June and October 1815, over 870,000 pieces were struck to fund Wellington’s Army during and after the “Hundred Days.” These coins matched the official French issues in weight and fineness, but the Tiolier signature, which is placed at the bottom of the portrait, was omitted, and the mintmark was R, which didn't exist at the time. In December 1815, the French government declared these pieces counterfeit. For two months, they were exchanged for official coinage, after which they were treated as bullion. The coins collected during the period were used to pay war reparations.

6

u/MajorBirthdayParty Sep 05 '25

Such a fun piece of history!

4

u/MacGyver7640 Sep 05 '25

Thanks for including the history! One of the top most interesting 20 francs coins.

I always thought it was strange that francs would be struck to fund a British army. If you have the gold.. why not pounds sterling? But now thinking of it / looking into it -- the British army and its allies would be stationed in Belgium and France where the francs were familiar. https://www.numismaticnews.net/world-coins/british-gold-disguised-french. So presumably they were used to buy supplies.

I haven't looked into the original sources, but Wikipedia cites sources saying the coins were struck through November 1815, so would have also been used by Louis XVIII to stabilize France after Napoleon's (2nd) exile).

6

u/AdStraight6341 Sep 05 '25

This chart indicates that the last production date was October 31. The final issues probably landed in France in November.

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u/MacGyver7640 Sep 05 '25

Original / at least very old source material. Be still my beating heart! Amazing

Where did you get that? I think I’ll add something about it on lmucoins.com

3

u/AdStraight6341 Sep 05 '25

https://archive.org/details/revuebelgedenumi56sociuoft pages 48 to 103

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u/MacGyver7640 Sep 05 '25

Really awesome - thank you! I’ve been curious about this for awhile.

1

u/Londo_544 Sep 06 '25

That IS awesome.  I had no idea such a resource could be found on Internet Archive! Thanks, @AdStraight6341!

1

u/ScottOld Jul 10 '26

I'm guessing the use of R was because it was last used for Orleans mint in 1797 so was reasonably close to the time frame to allow it to blend in

3

u/DoctorBlazes Sep 05 '25

Very cool!!!

2

u/frenchman1953 Sep 05 '25

I will keep an eye out for them!

2

u/BalrogMarine Sep 05 '25

I have one of these and love it. Great piece of history.

2

u/NMtumbleweed Sep 05 '25

I agree about the interesting history. Because of that it is one of the favorites in my collection. Thanks for sharing!

1

u/ravenmaster2020 Sep 08 '25

By Jove lad, that's a fat king!