T_LABEL_SUBPAGE_BANNER
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Coupon Categories: Objects
Updated: 29-01-2026 Added: 03-05-2025
This name referred to individual sections of ration cards. These cards also had coupons codes which entitled the bearer to extra rations depending on a specific supply brought into the ghetto. There were also coupons for laundry or bath. There were also special additional coupons. The system of coupons developed gradually; at its peak in the summer of 1943, there were the following types of coupons: "R" (Beirat) − heads of administrative departments, divisions, and departments within divisions, as well as for instructors, senior technical instructors and their families and adopted children; "L" − doctors and their families; “Ph” − pharmacists and their families; ”Pol” − Order Service and Fire Brigade with their families; “B-I” and “B-II” – office heads, secretaries, division group leaders, clerks, and meritorious officials – excluding family; “B-III” - division and department heads, to be distributed at their discretion for one-time-use; “CP” - permanent coupons for hard-working individuals excluding family; "CP-I" – issued the same way as “B-III” for one time use; “F” – permanent individual coupons for persons employed to remove impurities from cesspits (Pol. “fekaliści”− “fecalists”); “FI” – permanent individual coupons for refuse collectors. This system was abolished in December 1943 on the command of Hans Biebow.
 
The size of coupons was reported in detail in the Chronicle on August 10, 1943: “Overview of the holders of coupons. The Coupon Department provided us with an updated list of consumers holding all types of coupons. As we know, there are the following categories: category “R” – heads of divisions and departments, senior decree adoption [vide] (popular name: Beirat). Then there are the so-called “L” coupons for doctors and their family members, “PH” for pharmacists and their families, coupons for the Order Service and the fire brigade (these two groups grant allocations for only per person, as does “B-I”). Holders of coupons “B-I” and “B-II” are mostly heads of offices, secretaries, group instructors, clerks and meritorious officials. Coupon “B-III” is the socalled circulation coupon. Heads of plants and departments receive a certain number of such “B-III” coupons to be distributed at their discretion. Finally, there are the so-called “CP” vouchers (for hard-working individuals) and CP-I, like B-III (circulation coupon). The list of special allocations concludes with coupons for fecalists and garbage collectors. It should only be noted that the category of so-called “R” vouchers (Beirat) also includes individuals favored by the Chairman and previously also by Dawid Gertler (including meritorious individuals or those particularly close to the Chairman or Gertler).
The number of consumers is as follows:
 
R (Beirat) 2,236
Ph.  191
L 389
Order Service, fire brigade 1204
Total people 4020
   
B-I and B-II 1589
CP 377
B-III ca 2000 per ten days
CP-I   1800 per ten days
Fecalists   250 per ten days
Garbage collectors 250 per ten days
Total 6266 people
      
A total of 10286  people are benefiting from special coupons during the decade”1.
 
Jacek Walicki