5 Pfennig

Baruth in der Mark is a small Brandenburg town south of Berlin, and like hundreds of similar municipalities it issued emergency paper money — Notgeld — during the coin shortages that followed the First World War. These small-denomination pieces filled the gap left by hoarded metal, circulated locally, and were generally redeemed and destroyed within a year or two of issue, which is precisely why intact low-denomination examples are harder to find than the collector series produced slightly later for the philatelic trade.

The Schlemann signature identifies the issuing official responsible — Baruth's Magistrat, the civic administrative body, rather than any banking institution.