1 Mark

Schildberg — known today as Ostrzeszów — was a small administrative district in the Prussian province of Posen, a region with a majority Polish population under German rule. When the German banking system seized up in August 1914 following the outbreak of war, small-denomination coin vanished almost overnight as people hoarded metal. District and municipal authorities across Prussia scrambled to produce their own emergency paper — Notgeld in the truest sense — to keep local commerce moving.

This note was authorized by the Kreisausschuss, the elected district committee, and authenticated with an official seal and the countersignature of v. d. Wense, likely the Landrat or a senior administrator. No professional printer was involved; these early 1914 issues were typically produced by local print shops on whatever paper was available, which is why survivors show wide variation in paper quality and impression sharpness.

The province of Posen was ceded to Poland in 1919 under the Treaty of Versailles.