10 Cents Camp Ashby; PoW Camp

Camp Ashby, near Temperanceville on Virginia's Eastern Shore, held German prisoners during the Second World War — primarily agricultural laborers redirected into local farming operations after the U.S. began extracting economic value from its POW population under the Geneva Convention's labor provisions. The scrip issued there, including this 10-cent denomination, was designed to circulate only within the camp's canteen system, preventing prisoners from accumulating U.S. currency that might fund escape attempts.

The S&B catalogue (Schwan & Boling) documents this issue as part of a broader, loosely standardized program — individual camps often sourced their scrip locally, and production quality varies considerably across the series.