3 Reichsmark Buchenwald Concentration Camp

Buchenwald camp scrip was not money in any functional sense — it was a control mechanism. The SS introduced Lagergeld across the camp system in 1944 under orders from Himmler's office, ostensibly to create a semblance of economic normalcy and deflect Red Cross scrutiny, though the canteen goods it nominally purchased were scarce, overpriced, and largely inaccessible to the vast majority of prisoners.

The 1940 date here warrants caution. Buchenwald scrip is among the most extensively forged of all concentration camp material, with post-war reproductions circulating almost from the moment of liberation. Provenance documentation matters enormously for any example in this series.