Greenbacks depreciated in terms of gold, and gold rose in price in terms of greenbacks until, in June, 1864, it sold at 280 a hundred.

Fourteen years elapsed after the war before these notes rose to par, in terms of gold (in December, 1878), and they became legally redeemable in gold January 1, 1879.

This was called "the resumption of specie payments." Almost every nation has at some time issued political money.

During the Franco-Prussian War in 1870, France, through the medium of its great state bank, made forced issues of notes of a political nature, which only slightly depreciated.

Many countries--Russia, Austria, Portugal, Italy, and most of the South and Central American republics--have had or still have depreciated paper currencies.
At once, at the outbreak of the great war in 1914, the governments of the warring nations began to exercise a strict control over the issue of paper money, sought to gather into the public treasury all the specie, and to give paper (either governmental notes or bank notes) practically a forced circulation, making it almost the sole circulating medium.