10 Mark Eschwege; P.O.W. Camp

Eschwege was a Hessian garrison town pressed into service as an officer prisoner-of-war camp during the First World War. Under the Hague Conventions, officers could not be compelled to work, so camp administrations issued internal scrip partly to manage purchasing within the camp canteen economy and partly to prevent the accumulation of Reichsmark currency that might fund escape attempts.

The handstamp authentication was applied locally — there was no central Reich authority overseeing these issues, and each Kommandantur devised its own system. Forgery by inmates was a documented problem at several German officer camps, and the handstamp exists precisely because printed-only scrip proved too easy to replicate.