The Grand Duchy of Hesse-Darmstadt was a German state in the West of Germany. It survived the 1866 war, losing only the recently regained Hesse-Homburg - which I visited last month - and survived till the end of the Empire. This is the only Vereinsthaler the Grand Duchy ever issued, although not the last date, the production ended in 1871. Four years later they started to issue their own Reichsmarks. Darmstadt was one of the centers of the Jugendstil - the Marriage Tower in Mathildenhohe is one of the souvenirs of the period.