See full images - free registration
Continue with Google - no registration! or register with email

Why register? Just to keep bots out of our catalog. Your email stays private - we will never share it or send you anything uninvited. We guarantee you that!

2 Mark Frankfurt an der Oder; PoW Camp

Issuer Inspektion der Kriegsgefangenenlager im Bereich des III. Armeekorps
Year 1917
Type Log in to see details
Value Log in to see details
Currency Log in to see details
Composition Log in to see details
Size Log in to see details
Shape Rectangular
Printer Log in to see details
Designer(s) Log in to see details
Engraver(s) Log in to see details
In circulation to Log in to see details
Reference(s) Log in to see details
Obverse description Log in to see details
Obverse lettering Log in to see details
Reverse description Black text on a cream oval centrepiece set within a broad ornamental orange-printed border of interlaced foliate scrollwork in letterpress. The oval contains the full redemption conditions in seven numbered and unnumbered paragraphs in German Gothic script, listing the six camp commandant locations within the III Army Corps inspection area. The printer's imprint 'Ambrosius & Co. G.m.b.H. Kirchhain N.L.' appears below the oval at the foot of the note, and a green overprint stamp reading 'FRANKFURT ODER' is applied diagonally across the central oval.
Reverse lettering Log in to see details
Signature(s) Waldhausen (Der Inspekteur) and unknown (Der Adjutant)
Protection type Log in to see details
Protection description Log in to see details
Variants Log in to see details
Comments

Prisoner-of-war camp money issued under the III. Armeekorps inspectorate was a deliberately closed currency — it could only be spent within the camp canteen system and could not be exchanged for Reich marks, which was the whole point. Denying prisoners access to hard currency reduced escape incentives and prevented locals from being bribed.

Ambrosius & Co. in Kirchhain were a small regional printer who handled several of these Lagergeldseries contracts. The countersigning adjutant's name was not recorded in surviving documentation — a gap that appears consistently across this inspectorate's issues, not just this denomination.

YOU MAY ALSO LIKE