Bank of England note issues was decided to replace the 10/- note with the 50p coin. The ten-shilling note was withdrawn from circulation on 20 November 1970 following the introduction on 14 October 1969 of the fifty pence coin. The first Bank of England £1 note was issued on 2 March 1797 under the direction of Thomas Raikes, Governor of the Bank of England, and according to the orders of the government of William Pitt the Younger, in response to the need for smaller denomination banknotes to replace gold coin during the French Revolutionary Wars. The Bank of England's first £1 note since 1845 was
Bank of England £5 note 2016, with an initial print run of 440 million notes (worth £2.2 billion), over the period of co-circulation. It was announced that there would be a co-circulatory period with the old series E notes, and then on 5 May 2017, the series E would cease to be legal tender. However, as with all Bank of England notes, they can be exchanged at face value at any time in the future. In November 2016 there was controversy when the Bank of England confirmed that the new notes contain traces of tallow in the new notes. According to an online petition on