10 Cents Stockton; PoW Camp

Stockton's Camp Stockton held Axis prisoners — predominantly German and Italian — during the latter years of the war, and the canteen scrip issued there was a deliberate policy instrument, not a convenience. The Geneva Convention permitted prisoner canteen purchases, and the U.S. Army issued camp-specific currency partly to prevent POWs from accumulating dollars that could fund escape attempts or be passed outside the wire.

The Camb 8520 reference places this firmly in the documented American POW scrip series, but local California camp issues are considerably harder to trace than the standardized Army-printed series. Whether this note was printed by the camp administration itself or contracted locally remains difficult to establish with certainty.