In December 1795, the Directory decided to suspend the issuance of checks and paper money (assignats) and to destroy all the equipment used to produce them. A public destruction took place on February 18, 1796, in Place Vendôme in Paris: almost all the assignat printing plates and matrices were destroyed, and the paper used to produce the banknotes was burned, as were some of the notes themselves. Place Vendôme was not far from the Capuchin convent, where the assignat’s printing press had been located since 1792; the convent itself was destroyed at the beginning of the 19th century to make way for Rue de la Paix. By February 1796, when the production equipment was destroyed, the assignats were worth only 1/280 of their initial value. A period of chaos began, which would lead to the establishment of Napoleon Bonaparte.
