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History

The First Posters

In May 1940, a MoI memorandum had stated that “the best available brains should be conscripted at once. Big advertising agencies should be called into conference”. [Footnote 1] Although it was claimed that selling toothpaste involved ‘selling an idea’ as much as official propaganda did, [Footnote 2] M-O felt that not enough new thinking had been done about the different function of official propaganda; [Footnote 3] that established commercial practices were not necessarily suitable. Government propaganda was intended to produce a quicker result than commercial campaigns, which tend to have a slow, gradual impact, and, whilst commercial campaigns are judged to be effective if they achieve any upturn in sales, government campaigns were intended to reach everyone.

Commercial campaigns tend to “involve something new and supposedly useful or pleasant in return for reacting”, whilst official propaganda tended to ask people to make some kind of sacrifice, the benefits of which were not necessarily immediately obvious. [Footnote 4] Commercial propaganda also tends to use ‘polite solicitation’, a technique that was not considered appropriate for government campaigns, when many people felt that if the situation was urgent enough, the government would demand, not ask, that they do something. [Footnote 5]

A more positive difference was that whilst commercial advertisers were required to make the public conscious of, then build up positive attitudes towards, their product in order to achieve sales, the government already had its ‘product’ accepted and consumed. It was felt that the MoI was not taking enough advantage of this, although it was recognised that many people regarded the MoI as suspect. [Footnote 6]

Once it became obvious that war was inevitable, the MoI began making preparations for, amongst other things, the first poster to be produced. The poster was expected to:

i) attract immediate attention and evoke a spontaneous reaction.

ii) exert a steadying influence, i.e. the idea of tenacity and vigour.

iii) incite to action.

iv) harmonise with general preconceived ideas among the public.

v) be short.

vi) be universal in appeal. [Footnote 7]

These aims were very ambitious by any standards, but even at the time there were dissenting voices. Although the “danger of broad humour as a poster medium” [Footnote 8] was emphasised, one of the propagandists, E.M. Nicholson, tried to persuade his colleagues that the British people would respond much more readily to defiant and colloquial humour, rather than the high flown sentiments such as “We are fighting evil things. Against brute force and bad faith. Right will Prevail” [Footnote 9] which they were putting forward. He believed that a stress upon ‘attitude of mind’ was far more important than such solemn declarations, as “the British public were suspicious of lofty sentiment and reasoned argument”. [Footnote 10]

A.P. Ryan felt that “Parliament and Whitehall stand today, in their attitude towards news, publicity, advertising and propaganda, where business stood twenty years ago”. [Footnote 11] When business had accepted the necessity of advertising, it had believed that portraits of managing directors at the head of a letter press, written without regard to the public to which it was intended to appeal, were sufficient. [Footnote 12] The government believed that the working classes would best accept important information from those at the top, but McLaine argues that those in the Ministry were over-occupied with the question of class; rather than asking themselves what they would wish to hear in a given situation, “they proceeded on the assumption that the mass of their fellow citizens would need to be cajoled and wheedled into an acceptance of their obligations”. [Footnote 13] He believed that the emphasis upon good spirits and obedience, and the belief in a need for the oblique shepherding of public opinion, pointed to the Oxbridge background of many of the planners. [Footnote 14]

When war was actually declared the government had to act quickly in order to produce a series of posters and “Of necessity, the wording and design had to be simple, for prompt reproduction and quick absorption.” [Footnote 15] The series were designed to have a corporate identity, with a new and distinctive typeface, which, coincidentally, would make it difficult for the enemy to forge, [Footnote 16] with the only pictorial element a crown. Almost immediately, newspapers complained that the posters were both dull and egregious, [Footnote 17] with one reporter maintaining that although he passed them six times a day, he could not remember the slogan. [Footnote 18]

M-O published a major study into these first posters of war, [Footnote 19] their results tempered by the provisos that it was difficult to analyse such posters as little theory had been done on the topic before; that commercial posters take months or years to have an effect, whilst M-O were trying to measure effects after only a few weeks; that M-O had been unable to collect data prior to the study and so had nothing to compare it with. [Footnote 20]

The poster that has become the most well known of the series was intended to convey a “statement of duty of the individual citizen”. [Footnote 21] The wording for ‘YOUR COURAGE, YOUR RESOLUTION, WILL BRING US VICTORY’. ( Figure 9 ) was put forward by A.P. Waterfield, a career civil servant with no credibility in the field of publishing. [Footnote 22] Much is made of a distinction between ‘You’ and ‘Us’, implying that the people were fighting only for the government, and not for themselves. The MoI had used ‘your’ rather than ‘our’ as they believed that otherwise people would feel that they had a loophole to get out, that other people could cope. [Footnote 23] It is interesting to note is that the MoI had considered some First World War posters, including one with the words ‘THE GERMANS SAID YOU WERE NOT IN EARNEST. WE KNEW YOU’D COME AND GIVE THEM THE LIE’, and it was noted “in any future publicity of a similar nature the implied distinction between You and We … should be carefully avoided.” [Footnote 24]

The other poster proclaimed ‘FREEDOM IS IN PERIL, DEFEND IT WITH ALL YOUR MIGHT’, which even during the planning stages raised the criticism that ‘Freedom’ is rather an abstract concept and was “likely to be too academic and too alien to the British habit of thought”. [Footnote 25] M-O reported that people felt that they could not defend ‘freedom’ because they cannot feel that they are being attacked. [Footnote 26] The final poster ‘KEEP CALM AND CARRY ON’ was never used.

Responsibility for the failure of campaigns was placed squarely with the government as it meant that, either the people had not been made to feel the urgency of the message, or that “the leaders have not spoken in a language which the people can understand and respond to.” [Footnote 27] The fact that “three-quarters of the population left school before they were fifteen” [Footnote 28] appeared to have been ignored. Minister of Supply, Herbert Morrison’s simple slogan ‘GO TO IT!’ ( Figure 10 ), echoed in posters, appears to have been far more positively received than “instructions in stiff and incomprehensible language”, [Footnote 29] although there was concern that this campaign would not mean anything once taken out of context of the speech in which it was made, [Footnote 30] a fear that appears to have been justified since ‘What is ‘it’?’ was scrawled upon posters. [Footnote 31]

Lord Ashley argued that posters should be pictorial as

a picture can convey its message more rapidly than words. There are only rare exceptions to this: some two or three words may be so pregnant with meaning that, used alone, they solve the problem better than pictures. Even then, to be really effective, they must be displayed in dramatic, pictorial form. [Footnote 32]

It was suggested that it should be the job of the designer to abstract forms of life to produce a striking and cogent language, such as flags, which would be relevant to the working classes. [Footnote 33] Yet the campaign that succeeded ‘GO TO IT!’, ‘MIGHTIER YET’ (Figure 11), although apparently in accord with these ideas, fell sadly flat under Blitz conditions as it was vaguely reassuring, rather than related specifically to activities in which people were engaged. [Footnote 34] A far more successful design was ‘Firebomb Fritz’ (Figure 12), an animated incendiary bomb with outstretched hands of flame, with an expression that was “comic rather than terrifying”, which was believed to reassure people that firebombs were harmless if dealt with in time. [Footnote 35]

In 1940, Lord Woolton became Minister of Food, and in order to ensure that shoppers played their part in the ‘battle for food’, he decided to change existing Ministry propaganda posters. He criticised ‘Let your shopping save our shipping’ ( Figure 13 ), asking:

What could that mean to any ordinary housewife? She could not repeat it unless she had been very fortunate, or very wise, in the preservation of her teeth. [Footnote 36]

More direct slogans such as ‘Don’t waste bread’ were substituted to attract more popular appeal. Also in 1940, the famous slogan ‘Dig for Victory’ was coined by a London evening paper: prior to that “the Government had promoted food production under the less catchy ‘Grow More Food Campaign'”, [Footnote 37] and within days the image of the foot on the spade became a nationally recognised symbol ( Figure 14 ). [Footnote 38]

In 1941, two gas mask posters came in for criticism from M-O. In Figure 7 it was not clear that the illustration was a gas mask, and although the second half contained the more important message, the red text in the first half meant that it was remembered more. Figure 8 came in for even more criticism, primarily because the best known fact was put first, and consequently people did not bother reading any further. The poster was felt to be too cluttered, with no punch, more in the style of a leaflet, and indeed leaflets containing the same information had only recently been sent out, with a consequence that people felt they had seen it all before. [Footnote 39] The behaviour contained in the pictures was criticised for being casual and un-chivalrous, and the green colouring was felt to indicate a lack of emergency as green is generally perceived to be a safety colour. The Mass-Observationalist felt that there was more of a need for shock propaganda, showing the effects of gas, [Footnote 40] although Fougasse would have argued against this as he felt that people would not look again at a poster which distressed them. [Footnote 41] The timing was also felt to be bad as, after twenty months of war, there were no real worries about gas attacks. [Footnote 42]

In peace, in a democracy, personal interests of citizens tend to come before State interests, but in a time of war, “when the existence of the State and of the individual are equally threatened, the individual interest must be reduced for the temporary benefit of all”, [Footnote 43] although the war “forced the government to make some concessions to retain the allegiance of soldiers, war workers and their families”. [Footnote 44] The Beveridge report of 1942 was regarded by many as a future hope to work towards. Post-war aims were needed as it was recognised that people needed to be fighting for improvements in their own lives, rather than just for the government, although the A.B.C.A. commissioned posters ‘Your Britain, Fight for it now’, both came under fire from Churchill as he did not wish to give people false hopes and expectations.[Footnote 45] Frank Newbould’s poster, (Figure 15) which depicted an idyllic country scene, was criticised as the majority lived in urban areas, although another in the series, by Abram Games’ (Figure 16) was set in an urban background. Games’ poster was criticised by Churchill because he felt that the child pictured with rickets in the background presented an unfair view of life under the Conservatives in recent years.

Commercial posters were felt to be better designed and more colourful, and government posters were not considered to stand out amongst them. [Footnote 46] As the war went on little commercial material was being produced, and so the hoardings were deluged by government material, which although making the government poster more conspicuous, also made the “official message more wearisome because [it was] unrelieved”.[Footnote 47]

Hoarding sites used were those that could be obtained free-of charge, and

for economy reasons should only be fixed at points where there is a considerable amount of pedestrian traffic or large bodies gathered together … and all places where bodies of people are gathered together for special purposes. [Footnote 48]

For some campaigns, such as food, it was felt that posters of hoarding size were suitable only for long term programmes, but smaller sizes were prepared in anticipation and distributed to shopkeepers.[Footnote 49] Posters were produced in a range of different sizes, from small reminders in railway carriages and telephone booths, [Footnote 50] to hoarding size – the message repeated over and over again.

Although it is realised that we have only looked a few government posters, this chapter has given us an idea of the problems that the government faced when producing posters. In the following three chapters we will look at posters linked by three themes, restrictions and influence from foreign powers; the direct appeal; and women portrayed and appealed to in posters.

Footnotes:

  1. Memorandum to Lord Davidson and M. Nicholson from M. Cowan, 22/5/40, PRO, INF 1/533
  2. Unidentified, 27/3/41, from a selection of newspaper cuttings, collected by E. Embleton 1939-1946, held at the IWM (Hereafter, Embleton Collection, IWM)
  3. M-O A: Change No. 2, Home Propaganda for The Advertising Services Guild, [1942], p56
  4. Ibid.
  5. Ibid. p58
  6. M-O A: TC Posters, 3/G, ‘Letter from C.R. Casson to J.R.M. Brumwell :’Tom Harrison’s questions re: posters’, 14/8/41
  7. Home Publicity Enquiry Minutes, 04/05/39, PRO, INF 1/300
  8. Minutes of meeting held on 13/5/39, of the Home Section of International Propaganda and Broadcasting Enquiry, 16/5/39, p2, Ibid.
  9. McLaine, I. Ministry of Morale: Home Front Morale and the Ministry of Information in World War Two, 1979, p31
  10. Ibid.
  11. Memorandum from A.P. Ryan to the Minister of Information, 4 June 1941, PRO, INF 1/857
  12. Ibid.
  13. McLaine, I. Op. Cit., p22
  14. Ibid.
  15. J.M. Beable, President of the London Poster Advertising Agency in The Times, September 1939, Embleton Collection, IWM
  16. Minutes of meeting of Home Section of International Propaganda and Broadcasting Enquiry, 20/5/39, PRO, INF 1/300, pp1-2
  17. Unidentified, 1939, Embleton Collection, IWM
  18. Daily Mail, 7/2/40, Ibid.
  19. M-O A: FR 2, ‘Government Posters in Wartime’, October 1939
  20. Ibid. p3
  21. Minutes of meeting held on 13/4/39, of the Home Section of International Propaganda and Broadcasting Enquiry, 24/4/39, PRO, INF 1/300
  22. McLaine, I. Op. Cit., p31
  23. Balfour, M. Propaganda in the War 1939-45, Organisations, Policies and Publics in Britain and Germany, 1979, p57
  24. International Propaganda and Broadcasting Enquiry: Home Section: Official British Publicity Material published during the Great War 1914-1918, 1/6/39, p3, PRO, INF 1/317 (emphasis in original)
  25. Minutes of meeting held on 11/5/39, of the Home Section of International Propaganda and Broadcasting Enquiry, 16/5/39, p8, PRO, INF 1/300
  26. M-O A: TC Posters, 1/A, 6/10/39.
  27. M-O A: Change No. 2, Op. Cit., p5
  28. Ibid. p17
  29. McLaine, I. Op. Cit., p98
  30. Letter to Lord Davidson from John Rodgers, 27/05/40, PRO, INF 1/533
  31. Mr White, MP, Parliamentary Debates – Official Report, MoI, 3 July 1941, PRO, INF 1/857, p1561
  32. M-O A: TC Posters, 1/E, Havinden, A., ‘The Poster, The Public, The Designer, The Advertiser’ in Modern Publicity Yearbook 1939/40, p2
  33. Ibid, p3
  34. McLaine, I. Op. Cit., pp98-9
  35. Advertiser’s Weekly, 11/9/41, p206, Embleton Collection, IWM
  36. Davies, J. The Wartime Kitchen and Garden: The Home Front 1939-45, 1993, p35
  37. Ibid., p29
  38. Advertiser’s Weekly, 8/10/42, p48, Embleton Collection, IWM
  39. M-O A: FR 800, ‘Gas mask posters’, 21/07/41, p7
  40. Ibid.
  41. Fougasse A School of Purposes: Fougasse Posters, 1939-1945, 1946, p38
  42. M-O A: FR 800, Op. Cit., p14
  43. M-O A: Change No. 2, Op. Cit., p4
  44. Stevenson, J. British Society 1914-45, 1984, p457
  45. McLaine, I. Op. Cit., p182
  46. M-O A: FR 2, Op. Cit., pp33-4
  47. M-O A: Change No. 2, Op. Cit., p36
  48. Memorandum from Mr Galliano, Saward, Baker & Co. to Mr Hornsby, MoI, 19/5/42, PRO, INF 1/344
  49. Home Publicity Rationing Campaigns: Government announcement?, 29/10/39, p6, PRO, INF 1/343
  50. Advertiser’s Weekly, 10/12/42, p244, Embleton Collection, IWM

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History

The Administrative Context: The Ministry of Information and Social Surveys

Propaganda was under much closer government control in the Second World War than in the First World War, when there was a variety of “agencies which – constantly merging and splitting – discharged the various functions related to morale, news, censorship and propaganda”. [Footnote 1] Not until 1918 was a Ministry of Information created, under newspaper owner Lord Beaverbrook, to try and instil some order into the chaos, but its chief function appeared to be little more than as a circulator of propaganda to neutral countries, and it was disbanded very soon after the war ended.

In 1935, after recognising the success of Goebbels’ propaganda machine, the MoI was resurrected, but planners were unable to profit from the precedents set in the First World War as records were unable to be found, and one official had to resort to the Encyclopaedia Britannica in order to obtain a definition of ‘propaganda’. [Footnote 2] In the Second World War, the MoI was aiming for an entirely different audience to that of the First, when posters were largely used for recruitment to the armed services, and so such examples were not necessarily helpful anyway. Such posters tended to appeal to values of fair play, good sportsmanship, and a sense of shame in avoidance of duty, rather than to inspire devotion to ideals. Such posters were criticised as being rather drab in colour, short on humour and sex appeal, and with a tendency towards wordiness and over-full explanations. [Footnote 3]

MoI planners were already in full-time government jobs, [Footnote 4] and were therefore unable to devote their full attention to the MoI. [Footnote 5] They included R.W. Leeper, from the News Department of the Foreign Office, who had been very influential in setting up the British Council as a forum for ‘cultural propaganda’. [Footnote 6] The Ministry was disadvantaged as it underwent severe organisational changes, frequent shifts of senior personnel, and a steady erosion of its powers [Footnote 7] in its efforts to imitate existing Whitehall departments of state, although these had evolved pragmatically over time. Civil servants outnumbered public relations and advertising experts, producing an amateurish climate which sprung from the desire by the government to be seen not to be using German methods of propaganda, [Footnote 8] although some saw this as an advantage, producing propagandists with “fresh, open minds”. [Footnote 9]

As a consequence, when war broke out the MoI still had no clear cut objectives; Lord MacMillan, Minister of Information at the time, claimed that:

Not many people feel the urgency and importance of this fourth armament and recognise the severe and practical preparation which its effective use involve. [Footnote 10]

Even Reith, with a media background as director-general of the BBC, when appointed Minister in January, 1940 admitted that he did not know what the purpose of the job was. [Footnote 11] This was possibly because

ample lip service was paid to the importance of propaganda in wartime but behind the scenes… the spirit of scepticism is vocal … hence also the omission to define its functions or to endow it with a recognised authority in its own field. [Footnote 12]

As the war progressed, the government appeared to realise the importance of advertising the war, and it became possible for advertising experts “to obtain exemption from military service on the grounds of work of national importance”. [Footnote 13]

It was not until June 1941, when Churchill instructed all public relations officers to work as a team under the MoI, [Footnote 14] that the object of the Ministry was defined as:

not only the planning of general government information policy, but also the provision of common services for the public relations activities of other departments, who remained directly in control of their own information policy. [Footnote 15]

For instance, if the Ministry of Food wished to dissuade people from using certain foods, they would be required to finance the campaign, but if there was a general campaign against wastage it would be financed by the MoI. [Footnote 16] ‘Government posters’, therefore, cannot be regarded as though they were a singular unit, and conclusions drawn may not be applicable in all cases.

Sir John Reith replaced Lord MacMillan as Minister of Information on 5 January 1940, but was replaced by Duff Cooper on 12 May. It was not until 20 July 1941, when Brendan Bracken became Minister of Information, that the department began to achieve any real recognition.

Bracken possessed everything his predecessors had lacked: excellent press relations, a very close friendship with the Prime Minister, bustling confidence in tackling the Ministry’s adversaries, and a scorn for the exhortation of the British public. [Footnote 17]

Further details about the MoI have already been sufficiently discussed by McLaine. [Footnote 18]

M-O claimed that the government needed to control its channels of information, and develop a better listening-in system. In this first month of the war the Home Publicity section put “out propaganda on a basis of guess-work about effects, symbols, slogans, mass-reaction”, having no means for measuring or studying morale. [Footnote 19]

During the inter-war years, social sciences grew in popularity, with psycho-analysis becoming popular throughout society. The government had an awareness of the need to study the psychology of the masses in order to target their propaganda, although it would not countenance its use in decisions about poster designs [Footnote 20] and the “British Psychological Foundation was roundly rebuffed, although it provided the Ministry with a register of willing, largely Freudian-trained workers”. [Footnote 21] Generally information collected by the government was inaccurate; traditionally ‘public opinion’ had been deduced by studying the content of newspapers, and gauging how popular the opinions expressed in them were by the number of readers of each paper. However, it is very unlikely that many readers read every article, nor agreed with all the opinions expressed in the paper they were reading. During the 1930s two new organisations, which ostensibly made use of more systematic techniques to discover ‘popular’ opinion, were set up; these organisations were the Gallup poll, and M-O. [Footnote 22]

Although the government used the Gallup poll [Footnote 23] to provide statistics about various issues, we are more concerned with M-O as it made specific studies of government posters. M-O was founded in 1937, by Tom Harrisson, an anthropologist; Charles Madge, a poet (also an ‘inactive Communist’); and Humphrey Jennings, a documentary film maker. [Footnote 24] The aims of M-O were to “supply accurate observations of everyday life and real … public moods, an anthropology and a mass documentation” [Footnote 25] about the ‘masses’ whom, it was felt, should have interested the media and politicians more. Some information was gained from a panel of part-time observers, which provided “subjective private opinion”. [Footnote 26] It was felt that “too much attention has been paid in recent years to the method of direct questioning”, [Footnote 27] and emphasis was laid upon “seen behaviour or overheard conversation”. [Footnote 28] During the war, to survive, methods had to be adapted to produce more immediate results, such as a survey about gas mask posters, when visible results, such as an increased number of people wearing gas masks were taken to indicate success. [Footnote 29] (See Figures 7 and 8)

Although M-O was used by the government, as it could investigate a wide range of events at short notice, it was regarded as suspect as it was thought to be ‘on the left’, [Footnote 30] whilst Mary Adams claimed that reliance “on guess-work and partial surveys, or on information lodged by interested bodies can be misleading and dangerous”. [Footnote 31] She argued that there was a need for a continuous flow of regulated information on public thinking in order to formulate publicity measures and test their effectiveness. [Footnote 32] In 1940 it was determined that there was a need to “decide what we want people to do and believe, then to find out what they are thinking and doing now. This calls for the most up to date market research”. [Footnote 33] In consequence, the government set up a Home Intelligence Division of its own to investigate public morale.

The Home Intelligence Division had two distinct functions. The Home Intelligence Unit prepared reports on the morale of the home population, initially daily, later weekly, to be used not only by the MoI in planning its publicity, but also by any other departments. In June 1941, panels of correspondents were recruited to make reports on the state of public opinion in various regions, with action taken upon grievances that were revealed. The Wartime Social Survey was designed to produce regular quantitative results, [Footnote 34] to supplement the qualitative data provided by the Home Intelligence Unit, to make daily reports of facts likely to affect morale, and weekly reports into changes in public opinion and habits. Relevant information was to be sent to other government departments, [Footnote 35] although when asked for their reaction to a test study, [Footnote 36] only the Ministry of Food and Board of Trade had felt that they could make any use of the kind of information that was to be collected, with other ministries claiming that they had no need for the kind of results that would be produced. [Footnote 37]

The development of such an organisation was important as it meant the government had realised that it could not take public feeling and reactions to the war for granted, that it needed to ask the people, not the MPs. Orwell claimed that “the government has done extraordinarily little to preserve morale; it has merely drawn on existing measures of goodwill”, [Footnote 38] but this missed the point that the very fact that the MoI had come to realise that such goodwill existed, and that people were ready to accept restrictions “so long as they were seen as useful to the war effort and equitable in application”. [Footnote 39] Calder, however, claims that the government was not particularly concerned about their relationship with the ordinary people as:

Having found out what people thought and how they behaved, the rulers of the country could manipulate them more efficiently, while simultaneously conforming themselves to the lowest common denominator of public opinion. [Footnote 40]

Bracken felt that the MoI should be dissolved as soon as the war ended, but others felt that there were lessons to learnt from the First World War, when the MoI had disbanded so quickly: “What we learned in the last war, and which our enemies made the most of, we have pooh-poohed and bungled.” [Footnote 41] They felt that it still had much to do, including the re-education of Germany, the presentation of Britain’s case abroad, and the advancement of propaganda techniques through the study of other methods, in order to keep democracy alive. [Footnote 42]

Having explored the organisation that was behind the posters, we now will look at the first posters that it produced, and see if there was anything to be learnt from commercial techniques which had advanced considerably during the 1920s and 1930s

Footnotes:

  1. McLaine, I. Ministry of Morale: Home Front Morale and the Ministry of Information in World War Two, 1979, p12
  2. Ibid., p14
  3. Harper, P. War, Revolution and Peace, Propaganda Posters from the Hoover Institution Archives 1914-1945, [1969], p40
  4. See Taylor, P.M. The Projection of Britain: British Overseas Publicity and Propaganda 1919-1939, 1981, p263 for a full list of those on the sub-committee planning the MoI
  5. McLaine, I. Op. Cit., p14
  6. Taylor, P.M. Op. Cit., p266
  7. McLaine, I. Op. Cit., p3
  8. Weight, R. ‘State, Intelligentsia and the Promotion of National Culture in Britain, 1939-45’ in Historical Research Vol. 69, No. 168, February 1996, p85
  9. Zemen, Z. Selling the War: Art and Propaganda in World War II, 1978, p20
  10. Quoted in McLaine, I. Ministry of Morale: Home Front Morale and the Ministry of Information in World War Two, 1979, p15
  11. Ibid., p18
  12. Memorandum from A.P. Ryan to the Minister of Information, 4 June 1941, PRO, INF 1/857
  13. Begley, G. Keep Mum: Advertising Goes to War, 1975, p16
  14. McLaine, I. Op. Cit., p252
  15. Cantwell, J.D. The Second World War: A Guide to Documents in the Public Record Office, 1993, p114
  16. Memorandum from C.C.A. to Mr R.W. Harris, 9/11/39, PRO, INF 1/343
  17. McLaine, I. Op. Cit., p7
  18. See McLaine, I. Op. Cit. for further details on the organisation of the MoI or Lysaght, C.E. Brendan Bracken, 1979 for further details of Bracken’s involvement.
  19. M-O A: FR 1, ‘Channels of Publicity’, 11/10/39
  20. Stevenson, J. British Society 1914-45, 1984, p429
  21. Harper, S. ‘The years of total war: propaganda and entertainment’ in Gledhill, C. and Swanson, G. (eds) Nationalising Femininity: Culture, sexuality and British cinema in the Second World War, 1996, p194
  22. Addison, P. The Road to 1945, 1975, p15
  23. See Gallup, G.H. The Gallup International Public Opinion Polls: Great Britain 1937-1975 Vol. 1: 1937-1964, 1976 for details of questions asked, and results obtained.
  24. Calder, A. and Sheridan, D. Speak for Yourself: A Mass-Observation Anthology 1937-49, 1984, pp4-5
  25. Harrisson, T. Living Through the Blitz, 1976, p13 (emphasis in original)
  26. M-O A: FR 2, ‘Government Posters in Wartime’, October 1939, p3
  27. Ibid. (emphasis in original)
  28. Harrisson, T. Op. Cit., p13
  29. M-O A: FR 2, Op. Cit., p3
  30. McLaine, I. Op. Cit., p53
  31. Memorandum by Mary Adams, 26/01/40, PRO, INF 1/261
  32. Ibid.
  33. Memorandum from John Rodgers to John Davidson, 27/05/40, PRO, INF 1/533
  34. Letter to Mr Macadam from Mrs Adams, 29/6/40, PRO, INF 1/273
  35. Home Intelligence – Decisions taken by Director General, 27/9/40, Ibid.
  36. Survey of Public Opinion – Minute Sheet, 13/5/40, Ibid.
  37. Wartime Social Survey – Minutes of Meeting, 17/9/40, Ibid
  38. Quoted in Pope, R. War and Society in Britain, 1991, p40
  39. Ibid..
  40. Calder, A .The People’s War 1939-1945, 1969, p471
  41. Unidentified, 27/3/41, from a selection of newspaper cuttings, collected by E. Embleton 1939-1946, held at the IWM
  42. Barmas, J., a letter to Advertiser’s Weekly, undated, Ibid.

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What are ‘propaganda’ and ‘poster’?

If we are to discuss the efficiency of government Home Front propaganda, specifically as regards the posters that the government produced, it is important that we have a clear idea of what is meant by a ‘poster’, and by ‘propaganda’. This chapter will aim to give some idea of the definitions of these words, with reference to how they have been regarded in the past, and since the Second World War, and how this affected attitudes to them.

Propaganda is the attempt to influence opinions and attitudes, or to reinforce existing ideas and beliefs, through suggestion and persuasion, rather than by physical or financial inducement. It “is ethically neutral and it is the values of those using it that make it either good or bad”. [Footnote 1] Nowadays, the word ‘propaganda’ generally holds negative connotations, signifying “a bundle of lies propagated by devious methods and irrational appeals”. [Footnote 2] However, in “its origins ‘propaganda’ is an ancient and honourable word. … It was in later times that the word came to have a selfish, dishonest, or subversive association.” [Footnote 3] Yet even during the war the word ‘propaganda’ held negative connotations in Britain: “Propaganda was something in which the enemy engaged, while one’s own propaganda was regarded as ‘information’ or ‘publicity’.” [Footnote 4] Note that whilst totalitarian Germany had a Ministry of Popular Enlightenment and Propaganda, democratic Britain and America had a Ministry of Information and an Office of War Information respectively, although all appeared to serve basically the same function: the manipulation and control of information that was spread to the public. [Footnote 5]

The ‘poster’ was one means by which such information was spread to the public. Although at first it appears that everyone must know what a poster is, according to Rickards “In the late 1960s the word ‘poster’ was being applied to any single visual presentation printed on a fair-sized sheet of paper” [Footnote 6] and therefore, defining exactly what a poster is is far more difficult:

Firstly… the poster is a separate sheet, affixed to an existing surface (as opposed to those markings and images rendered directly on the surface). Secondly, it must embody a message; a mere decorative image is not enough. Thirdly, it must be publicly displayed. Finally, it must have been multiply produced; a single hand-done notice is not a poster. [Footnote 7]

However, even this definition is not entirely comprehensive: it does not exclude such things as printed notices which cannot really be regarded as posters, nor does it explain what the purpose of a poster may be. Susan Sontag added a further definition: “A public notice aims to inform or command. A poster aims to exhort, to sell, to educate, to convince, to appeal”, [Footnote 8] which although still not an exhaustive definition, as many public displays including government posters, overlap both areas, gives a good working definition.

Official proclamations could perhaps be seen to be the forerunner to posters. Initially, they consisted merely of words, but by the fifteenth century, after Gutenberg’s invention of moveable type, began to include pictures. [Footnote 9] The pictorial element was gradually to change from mere decoration to a major ingredient, until in 1871, in Frederick Walker’s design The Woman in White, the picture became the most important element. As the work of the artist became more and more important, the wording and the image begun to be treated separately, a trend that continued until the 1920s and 1930s.

“By the 1890s designers had learned how to convey messages in a manner that, however complex its aesthetic elements, spoke clearly and was easily understood even from a distance”, [Footnote 10] and the poster became almost a cult object, with serious collectors, and collectors’ magazines. With industrialisation, and mass production, producers fought for bill board space, and plagiarism of designs became rife. With the First World War the poster “turned from selling the comforts of peace to pressing the demands of war”. [Footnote 11] The Germans expressed doubts: “Should an army be raised by the same means as customers for jam?” [Footnote 12] Over the course of the war the poster became an acceptable means of selling, or recruiting for, the war. Although the Germans believed that “British propaganda in World War I… [had] set a new standard for effectiveness”, [Footnote 13] organisation for poster campaigns had been very poor as campaigns were only developed if an idea for one occurred to someone in a government department, and was then approved.

With better communications during the 1920s and 1930s, poster designers had been able to gain ideas from one another, and many graphic techniques had been experimented with and circulated. The ideas of the Constructivist movement were spread from the USSR by El Lissitsky (Figure 2), and by refugees after 1935, when Socialist Realism (Figure 3) became the official art form in the USSR. Constructivism was a movement which had devised photo-montage and experimented with “spatial dynamics, geometric forms and flat, bright colours”. [Footnote 14] Ludwig Hohlwein, a German poster designer, was an important influence upon European poster design, believing that art work should not be merely ‘artistic’, that it was the message that was important, able to be absorbed with the briefest of glances. (Figure 4) [Footnote 15] New ideas were also spread by refugees escaping Nazism, including Moholy-Nagy (Figure 5), who arrived in Britain in 1935, a pioneer of the Bauhaus movement, [Footnote 16] which stressed that the typeface should be regarded as an important and integral part of poster design (Figure 6).

During the war, the aim of ‘propaganda posters’, according to Kenneth Bird, otherwise known as Fougasse, was to overcome three obstacles:

Firstly, a general aversion to reading any notice of any sort; secondly a general disinclination to believe that any notice, even if it was read, can possibly be addressed to oneself; thirdly, a general unwillingness, even so, to remember the message long enough to do anything about it. [Footnote 17]

However, during the war the poster played a lesser role than in the First World War, as, with advances in technology, the radio was seen as a better means for disseminating more immediate information, although many people had lost their radio sets as dealers cancelled H.P. terms, or ran out of battery sets. [Footnote 18] Large numbers of posters were produced, but their use was mainly reserved for long term campaigns as they took a long time to prepare. [Footnote 19] Posters gave information about such subjects as rationing and petrol restrictions, and advice on such subjects as health and diet.

In the 1950s the poster, as defined by Dart, became chiefly an accessory to the television image, and has largely remained so, although for those without access to television size budgets, such as protesters and small companies, the poster has always remained an important medium. Since the 1960s poster reprints have become popular, a category in which we could include the posters reprinted by the IWM, although there were also designs which were specifically made for the reprint market.

We are now bombarded with such quantities of commercial, social and political propaganda, that picture posters today appear to be relatively harmless, through visual media whose persuasiveness and effectiveness make it seem so, [Footnote 20] the poster will probably always be regarded as important as it can take “arguments directly to the man on the street”. [Footnote 21] It is regarded as particularly important for election campaigns, as a poster can express in a nutshell a specific party policy, either complimentary towards one’s own party, or derogatory to an opposing party, for instance “New Labour, Euro Danger”.

Having considered some of the different techniques of, and uses for, posters through history, we will now look at the organisation behind many of the posters produced in the Second World War.

Footnotes:

  1. Marshall Cavendish Images of War: The Real Story of World War II Vol. 4, No. 64, 1996, p1767
  2. Collier, P.F. Collier’s Encyclopaedia CDRom
  3. American Historical Association ‘What is Propaganda?’ (1944) in Boehm, E. Behind Enemy Lines: WWII Allied/Axis Propaganda 1989 p19
  4. Marshall Cavendish Op. Cit. p1766
  5. See Jowett, G. and O’Donnell, V. Propaganda and Persuasion, 1987 for further details of the methods of propagandists, and what to look for when studying propaganda.
  6. Rickards, M. The Rise and Fall of the Poster 1971 p39
  7. Adams, Dart ‘Posters of Protest and Revolution’ (1970) Quoted in Rickards, M. The Rise and Fall of the Poster 1971 p7 (emphasis in original)
  8. Quoted in Rickards, M. Op. Cit., p8
  9. McQuiston, L. Graphic Agitation, 1993, p14
  10. Paret, P., Lewis, B.I. and Paret, P. Persuasive Images: Posters of War and Revolution 1992 p2
  11. Rickards, M. Op. Cit., p25
  12. Ibid., p25
  13. Campbell, J. (ed) The Experience of World War II 1989 p196
  14. McQuiston, L. Op. Cit., p18
  15. Hollis, R. Graphic Design: A Concise History, 1994, p31
  16. Ibid., p95
  17. Fougasse A School of Purposes: Fougasse Posters, 1939-45, 1946, p11
  18. M-O A: FR 1, ‘Channels of Publicity’, 11/10/39
  19. Home Publicity: Government Announcement, October 1939, PRO, INF 1/343
  20. Harper, P. War, Revolution and Peace, Propaganda Posters from the Hoover Institution Archives 1914-1945, [1969], p5
  21. McQuiston, L. Op. Cit., p31

If you wish to cite from this page, please use the following citation:

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Forward to The Administrative Context: The Ministry of Information and Social Surveys

Categories
History

Introduction

In the fifty-two years since the end of the Second World War, modes of historical study have changed greatly. Emphases of study have changed from the study of great men to the study of the ordinary people, and the issues that concerned them. The posters produced during the Second World War are a part of this history.

Visually, they cannot be regarded as great works of art; neither were they intended as such by the artists concerned…. But besides their message they tell us something of the prevailing manners and customs. They also mirror the changing fortunes of the war.[Footnote 1]

We are surrounded by images from the past. Artefacts from the past have attracted varying responses, ranging from awe to greed, from nostalgia to simple curiosity – or indifference. And sometimes the historian has turned to them when seeking to verify or challenge some legend or fable or well-attested narrative handed down from the past by word of mouth or in written texts. [Footnote 2]

The use of art for historical purposes is important when we consider what it is hoped to gain from the study of posters of the Second World War. In early history artefacts were used as important evidence, yet by the fifteenth century, due to the recovery of much ancient literature, the written word dominated historical sources. Humanist historians were concerned not with evoking the past, but with drawing moral and intellectual lessons from it, and art was left to antiquarians. [Footnote 3]

However, since the last century, the importance of the pictorial sources has increased. It is now accepted that artefacts can be used to broaden the area of study, but in order to make the fullest use of an artefact as a source, it is important for the historian to establish what it is that is being looked at, its authenticity, when and for what purpose it was made, and how it was received. Historians also need to be aware of any circumstances, conventions or constraints that govern representations in art, and the “technical means available for expressing this vision”.[Footnote 4] In wartime, for instance, there was little paper available.

During the last couple of decades the propaganda poster as a souvenir item has become popular, with visitors to the Imperial War Museum (IWM) able to buy reproductions of posters in poster and postcard form, with the range expanding in more recent years. Visitors can now buy reproductions of posters on such items as key-rings, mugs, playing cards and chocolate bars, to name but a few, although in a fairly limited range of designs. It can therefore be seen that there is still a lot of interest in these posters now, and it is suggested that there is something in the images contained in the posters that still has appeal for the British public now, although it is a possible that this will diminish now that the fiftieth anniversary of the end of the war is over.

We must not forget “how erratic and potentially misleading a process has been the survival of most visual evidence”. [Footnote 5] Due to the efforts of the IWM and the Public Record Office (PRO) it appears that many examples of Home Front posters have survived. However, there is still an element of selection in those posters that remain on view; the IWM has many more posters in storage than it is possible to display. It was considered important to look at originals of posters, as the effect is very different from that produced by looking solely at postcards. The historian can then gain some idea of how posters looked to contemporaries, although obviously we do not get to see them in their full context, nor the magnificent hoarding size posters.

Posters were centrally produced and distributed and therefore are more reliable as an indicator of government mentality than, for instance, speeches to workers at lunch-times, although believing that the public distrusted ‘official information’ the Ministry of Information (MoI) sought to remain anonymous as far as possible. As a result, most wartime posters remain undated and unsourced, making it almost impossible to follow the development of MoI campaigns through the war, although poster content and newspaper reports give us some clues as to the date of poster campaigns.

The main source for governmental papers is the PRO at Kew. These are important as they give us an understanding of the planning stages, although we must remember that the papers that are stored at the PRO account for only “one per cent of the paperwork created by the state each year”. [Footnote 6] Mass-Observation (M-O) contains a unique collection of qualitative data, providing us with a view of “private opinions which people might be reluctant to express to a pollster”. [Footnote 7] Although its panel of volunteer observers was heavily skewed towards those in the middle classes, and the south-east of England, this is not felt to discredit its findings. [Footnote 8]

For many, the wartime slogans, such as ‘Dig for Victory’, ‘Careless Talk Costs Lives’ and ‘Coughs and Sneezes Spread Diseases’ blaring at them from every side, from the radio, the big screen, newspapers and hoardings, have never been forgotten, and such slogans have been passed on as a part of our common heritage. Yet, the poster appears to be the most enduring memory that is held, and one would question why. Research into the images contained in Second World War Home Front posters, the decisions that went into the use of these images, and the reception of these images by the British public are important, particularly in relation to the way that the government tried to collect responses and whether they changed their campaigns accordingly.

Posters that were not published or were withdrawn also make for interesting study, particularly for reasons as to why they were rejected, such as whether there were certain images that made such posters offensive. However, there do not seem to be many examples of these, although whether this is because records of unsuccessful designs were not kept or because there were not many anyway, was not established.

There “must be a reasonably fertile field to nourish the propagandist’s seed before it can be expected to ripen into attitudes and opinions”, [Footnote 9] and therefore it is important to understand how the war affected civilians, but many studies have already been done in this area, [Footnote 10] and it is not wished to repeat such information here. We can then understand the meanings behind some of the images used in posters, and understand how, for instance, during particularly bleak periods there was seen to be a need for morale-boosting propaganda. We will look at whether the government felt that propaganda constituted the ‘fourth armament’, and may then be able to understand the way in which the government balanced the use of persuasion and legislation in its campaigns so necessary for the survival of Britain.

In chapter one we will establish a brief, general history of the poster, including advances in graphic techniques and its use in the past. We can then look at how it was actually used in the war, but with particular emphasis upon the extent to which the poster was used in the propaganda ‘battle’ on the ‘Home Front’, both terms which are used today without a thought for how such terms were popularised through wartime propaganda. To avoid anachronisms, we also need to understand that the poster may serve an entirely different purpose now as to that of wartime Britain. Although little reference is made in this study to other propaganda methods, such as newspapers, the cinema, [Footnote 11] and radio, [Footnote 12] posters “generally form part of a larger scheme, and their functions cannot be judged without knowledge of the underlying policy and the plans for the campaign as a whole”. [Footnote 13]

In chapter two we will look briefly at the development and organisation of the MoI, and see to what extent First World War experiences affected both the way that the poster was used in the Second World War, and the use of particular images within posters. We will also see what steps the government took to ensure that its propaganda was appropriate, including the use of sources such as M-O and the Home Intelligence Division.

In chapter three we will see if the government learnt any lessons from the commercial world, and look at the first posters that they produced, generally perceived to be failures, although this is possibly as every historian is reliant upon M-O as the main critical source. [Footnote 14] We will then look at subsequent posters to see if the government appeared to learn any lessons from the criticisms of the first posters.

In Second World War posters there is a conspicuous absence of ‘hate xenophobia’ which was a staple ingredient of First World War posters. In chapter four we see some of the effects of relations between the British government and foreign powers, in particular their attempts to distinguish between ruling ideologies and the general populace. We will look particularly at the impact of Soviet propaganda on British posters.

The best remembered poster from the First World War is the pointing finger of Kitchener (Figure 1); in chapter five, we will see how some posters used this method. We will then look at other techniques by which the direct consequences of their actions were put across to the British public.

Through chapter six we will see the way that women were portrayed, and appealed to, in posters. We will gain an idea of the roles that women were expected to fulfil, in the home and in the services. We will look particularly at the use of glamour in posters, which was used both to appeal to new recruits, and to indicate the dangers of careless talk and the ‘easy woman’. We will also look at two posters that were rejected, and try to understand the reasons for this.

Although several popular relevant histories have been published, [Footnote 15] which are useful to see how various myths about the war are perpetuated, we must be aware of the dangers of using such over-simplified histories. In both popular and academic studies the poster tends to be seen as ancillary to other issues of war, or used simply as an illustration, rather than studied in its own right. Even though there are several books which have been published on the subject of wartime posters, [Footnote 16] it is not one that has been fully explored, and more often posters are studied within a more general book on government propaganda. [Footnote 17] British posters in particular, have been neglected in favour of Nazi propaganda, with no study especially focusing upon what the government believed the people needed to hear, but rather approaching posters as evidence of what the people felt, a gap which this study, concentrating upon British government Home Front posters, will attempt to fill.

Footnotes:

  1. Cantwell, J.D. Images of War: British Posters 1939-45 1989 p4
  2. Haskell, F. History and its Images: Art and the Interpretation of the Past 1993, p1
  3. Ibid., p2
  4. Ibid.
  5. Ibid., p3
  6. Fowler, S. ‘The Nation’s Memory’ in Martin, A.M. (ed) Despatches: the Magazine of the Friends of the Imperial War Museum, April 1997, p5
  7. Bell, P.M.H. John Bull and the Bear: British Public Opinion, Foreign Politics and the Soviet Union, 1941-1945, 1990, p10
  8. Calder, A. and Sheridan, D. Speak for Yourself: A Mass-Observation Anthology 1937-49, 1984, p74
  9. American Historical Association ‘What is Propaganda?’ (1944) in Boehm, E. Behind Enemy Lines: WWII Allied/Axis Propaganda 1989 p24
  10. Suggested studies include Calder, A .The People’s War 1939-1945, 1969 and Longmate, N. How We Lived Then, 1977
  11. For further information on this topic, see Richards, J. and Sheridan, D. (eds) Mass-Observation at the Movies, 1987
  12. For further information on this topic, see Briggs, A. The War of Words: A History of Broadcasting in the United Kingdom Vol. 3, 1970
  13. Advertiser’s Weekly, 8/10/42, p44, from a selection of newspaper cuttings, collected by E. Embleton 1939-1946, held at the Imperial War Museum
  14. MO-A: FR 2, ‘Government Posters in Wartime’, October 1939
  15. Including Begley, G. Keep Mum: Advertising Goes to War, 1975; Briggs, S. Keep Smiling Through, 1975; Costello, J. Love, Sex and War 1939-1945, 1985; Davies, J. The Wartime Kitchen and Garden: The Home Front 1939-45, 1993; Freeman, R.A. Britain at War, 1990; H.M.S.O. Persuading the People, 1995; INDEX The Spirit of Wartime, 1995 and Marshall Cavendish Collection, ‘Selling the War’ in Images of War No.64, 1996.
  16. Including Cantwell, J.D. Images of War: British Posters 1939-45, 1989 and Darracott, J. and Loftus, B. (Imperial War Museum) Second World War Posters, 1972
  17. Including H.M.S.O. Persuading the People, 1995 and Balfour, M. Propaganda in the War 1939-45, Organisations, Policies and Publics in Britain and Germany, 1979

If you wish to cite from this page, please use the following citation:

Lewis, R.M., ‘Chapter 1: Introduction, Undergraduate Thesis: The planning, design and reception of British home front propaganda posters of the Second World War'<URL>, written April 1997, accessed Enter Date Here

Back to List of Illustrations
Forward to ‘Poster’ and ‘Propaganda’ – What are they?

Categories
History

List of Pictorial Illustrations

Due to a desire by the Ministry of Information (MoI) to remain anonymous information concerning Second World War posters is very scanty, with dates and details of artists rarely available.

Unless otherwise stated, posters are British, and seen/assumed to be the most common size: 20″ x 30″, with reproductions taken from postcards or IWM copies. STILL IN PROGRESS

Fig. Title
1 Your Country Needs You (Kitchener)‘Britons [Kitchener] wants YOU’

Date: 1914-1916

Artist: Alfred Leete (1882-1933)

Printer: Victoria House Printing Co. Ltd., London

Size: 291/2” x 20″

Source: IWM PST 2734

2 Beat the Whites with the Red Wedge‘Klinom Krasnym bei Belykh’ (Beat the Whites with the Red wedge)

Origin: U.S.S.R., 1919

Artist: El Lissitsky

Source: Lissitsky, K. El Lissitsky, 1968, Plate 4

3 Russian PeasantUdarnuiu uborku bol’shevistskomu urozhaiu’ (For shock-brigade reaping and
for a Bolshevik harvest)

Origin: U.S.S.R., 1934

Artist: Maria Voron

Size: 41″ x 28″

Source: (Hoover Institution Archives: RU/SU 1611) in Paret, P., Lewis, B.I., and Paret, P. Persuasive Images: Posters of War and Revolution, 1992, p115

4 Und Du?Und Du? (And you?)

Origin: Germany, 1932

Artist: Ludwig Hohlwein

Size: 34″ x24″

Source: (Hoover Institution Archives: GE1694) in Paret, P., Lewis, B.I., and Paret, P. Persuasive Images: Posters of War and Revolution, 1992, p109

5 Pneumatik‘Pneumatik’

Origin: Germany, 1926

Artist: Laszlo Moholy-Nagy

Source: Kostelanetz, R. (ed) Moholy-Nagy, 1970, Plate 27

6 CExample of Bauhausover for Bauhaus no. 1

Date: 1928

Origin: Germany

Artist: Herbert Bayer

Source: Willett, J. The Weimar Years: a culture cut short, 1984, p45

7 Hitler Will Send No WarningHitler will send no warning – so always carry your gas mask’

Date: 1941

Printer: J. Weiner Ltd., London

Source: IWM PST 0415 (Opie, R. The Wartime Scrapbook: from Blitz to Victory, 1995, p10)

8 Gas Attack‘Gas Attack’

Date: 1941

Printer: Fosh and Cross Ltd., London

Source: IWM PST 0136 (MO-A: Poster Inventory)

9 Your Courage, Your Cheerfulness, Your ResolutionYour courage, your cheerfulness, your resolution, will bring us victory’

Date: 1939

Source: IWM PST 0052 (Hunt, J. and Watson, S. Britain and the Two World Wars, 1990, p124)

10 Go to it!‘Go to it!’

Printer: Perry Colourprint, London

Source: IWM PST 0661

11 Mightier Yet (Tank)Mightier Yet’

Artist: Harold Pym

Printer: Greycaine Ltd, London

Source: IWM PST 4086

12 Beat Firebomb FritzFirebomb Fritz’

Printers: Fosh and Cross Ltd., London

Source: IWM PST 0199

13 ‘LLet Your Shopping Help Our Shippinget your shopping help our shipping’

Printer: J. Weiner Ltd., London

Size: 10″ x 15″

Source: IWM PST 0708 (Briggs, S. Keep Smiling Through, 1975, p155)

14 ‘DigDig for Victory (spade) for Victory’

Printer: J. Weiner Ltd., London

Source: IWM PST 0059

15 Your Britain, Fight for it now (Newbould)Your Britain, Fight for it now’

Date: 1942

Artist: Frank Newbould (1887-1951)

Printer: Adams Bros and Shardlow, Ltd.

Size: 197/8” x 293/4

Source: IWM PST 0069

16 ‘YYour Britain Fight For It Now (Abram Games)our Britain, Fight for it now’ (Finsbury Health Centre)

Date: 1942

Artist: Abram Games

Printer: Henry Hildesley Ltd., London

Size: 197/8” x 295/16

Source: IWM PST 2911

17 In Spite of... there's work to be doneIn spite of [Hitler] there’s work to be done

Source: Begley, G. Keep Mum: Advertising Goes to War, 1975, p28

18 Fougasse (but of course it mustn't go any further)‘….. but of course it mustn’t go any further!’

Date: 1940

Artist: Fougasse

Size: 24″ x 40″

Source: IWM PST 3725 (M-O A: Poster Inventory)

19 Nazi War Aims: Grab Grab GrabNazi War Aims – Grab! Grab!! Grab!!!’

Size: 20″ x 141/2

Source: IWM PST 8151

20 ‘TThe Red Army's Fight Is Your Fighthe Red Army’s Fight is Your Fight’

Date: 1941

Source: Freeman, R.A. Britain at War, 1990, p55

21 The Moscow Standard‘The Moscow Standard’

Source: H.M.S.O. Persuading the People, 1995, p78

22 Russia's Fight is Ours!Russia’s Fight is Ours!’

Printer: William Brown and Co. Ltd., London

Size: 393/4” x 193/8

Source: PRO, INF 13/123/19 (Cantwell, J.D. Images of War: British Posters 1939-45, 1989, Plate 43)

23 MANEATER‘Maneater’

Source: IWM PST 0176

24 Careless Talk Costs Lives: You Never Know Who's Listening  (Fougasse)‘You never know who’s listening!’

Date: 1940

Artist: Fougasse

Size: 121/2” x 8″

Source: IWM PST 0142 (Darracott, J. and Loftus, B. (Imperial War Museum) Second World War Posters, 1972, p28)

25 ‘WWhen It's Up To UsHEN? it’s up to us!’

Date: 1941

Source: Marshall Cavendish Collection, Images of War, 1996

26 ‘Women of Britain, arm him’

Printer: Stafford and Co. Ltd., Nottingham

Source: IWM PST 3378

27 ‘Women
of Britain, Come Into the Factories’

Artist: Zec

Printer: Lowe and Brydone, London

Source: IWM PST 3645

28 ‘Cover
your hair for safety. Your Russian sister does!’

Printer: Loxley Bros Ltd., London

Source: IWM PST 3151 (McLaine, I. Ministry of Morale: Home
Front Morale and the Ministry of Information in World War Two
,
1979, Plate 10)

29 ‘Keep
on Saving’

Printer: Chromoworks Ltd., London Size: 591/2
x 393/4

Source: PRO, NSC 5/139 (Cantwell, J.D. Images of
War: British Posters 1939-45
, 1989, Plate 65)

30 ‘Together!’

Date: Passed for publication 22/8/41

Printer: Lowe and Brydone, London

Source: IWM PST 3158 and PRO, INF 2/3/277 (Cantwell, J.D. Images
of War: British Posters 1939-45
, 1989, Plate 37)

31 ‘Combined
Operations Include You’

Artist: Harold Pym

Printer: Chromoworks Ltd., London

Size: 293/4” x 193/4

Source: PRO, INF 13/122/21 (Cantwell, J.D. Images of War:
British Posters 1939-45
, 1989, Plate 44)

32 ‘Dig
on for Victory’

Artist: Peter Fraser

Source: PRO, INF 3/96

33 ‘Is
your journey really necessary?’

Date: 1942-1944

Artist: Bert Thomas

Printer: Haycock Press, London

Size: 243/4” x 193/4

Source: IWM PST 0144 and PRO, AN 2/1126

34 ‘Deserve
Victory’

Publisher: Graham and Gillies Ltd., London

Source: IWM PST 3107

35 ‘Coughs
and sneezes spread diseases’

Date: Early 1942

Artist: H.M. Bateman

Printer: Chromoworks Ltd., London

Size: 2813/16” x 1911/16

Source: IWM PST 3429

36 ‘Turn
this raw material into war material’

Printer: W.E. Berry Ltd., Bradford

Source: IWM PST 3757

37 ‘Paper,
Metal, Bones, Rags and Rubber for Salvage’

Artist: Fougasse

Printer: Flemings, Leicester

Size: 40″ x 24″

Source: IWM PST 3702

38 ‘A
few careless words may end in this’

Date: c.1940

Artist: Norman Wilkinson

Printer: Greycaine Ltd., Watford and London

Size: 20″ x 147/8

Source: IWM PST 0740 and PRO, INF 13/216/3 (Cantwell,
J.D. Images of War: British Posters 1939-45, 1989, Plate 20)

39 ‘They
talked…’

Printer: J. Weiner Ltd., London

Size: 91/2” x 14″

Source: IWM PST 0709 (Life, 30/11/40, from a selection
of newspaper cuttings, collected by E. Embleton 1939-1946, held at the
Imperial War Museum)

40 ‘She
talked…’

Printer: Fosh and Cross Ltd., London

Source: IWM PST 5239 (Life, 30/11/40, from a selection
of newspaper cuttings, collected by E. Embleton 1939-1946, held at the
Imperial War Museum)

41 ‘He
talked…’

Source: Life, 30/11/40, from a selection
of newspaper cuttings, collected by E. Embleton 1939-1946, held at the
Imperial War Museum

42 ‘ATS
at the wheel’

Artist: Beverley Pick

Printer: Field Sons and Co., Bradford

Size: 291/4” x 191/4

Source: IWM PST 4946 and PRO, INF 13/42/8

43 ‘Go
through your wardrobe’

Artist: Donia Nachshen

Printer: W.R. Royle and Sons Ltd., London

Size: 293/4” x 193/4

Source: IWM PST 4773 and PRO, INF 13/144/1

44 ‘Join
the ATS’

Date: 1941

Artist: Abram Games

Printer: Fosh and Cross Ltd, London

Size: 283/4” x 191/16

Source: IWM PST 5207

45 ‘YOU
are wanted too! Join the A.T.S’

Date: 1941

Source: Sunday Express, 26/10/41 from a selection of newspaper
cuttings, collected by E. Embleton 1939-1946, held at the Imperial War
Museum

46 ‘Lend
a hand on the land at a farming holiday camp’

Artist: Eileen Evans

Printer: Chromoworks Ltd., London

Source: IWM PST 0143

47 ‘Join
the Women’s Land Army’

Printer: Fosh and Cross Ltd, London

Size: 30″ x 191/2

Source: PRO, INF 13/140/19 (Cantwell, J.D. Images of War:
British Posters 1939-45
, 1989, Plate 10)

48 ‘Careless
talk costs lives. Keep mum, She’s not so dumb!’

Artist: G. Lacoste

Date: c.1940

Printer: Johnson, Riddle and Co. Size: 147/8
x 97/8

Source: IWM PST 2817 and PRO, EXT 1/119/20 (Cantwell, J.D.
Images of War: British Posters 1939-45, 1989, Plate 19)

49 ‘Careless
talk costs lives. Keep mum – she’s not so dumb’

Size: 143/4” x 93/4

Source: PRO, EXT 1/119/19 (Cantwell, J.D. Images
of War: British Posters 1939-45
, 1989, Plate 18)

50 ‘Careless
talk costs lives. Tell nobody – not even her’

Size: 143/4″ x 97/8″

Source: (Cantwell, J.D. Images of War: British Posters
1939-45
, 1989, Plate 16)

51 ‘Careless
talk costs lives. Tell nobody – not even her’

Size: 147/8″ x 97/8″

Source: PRO, EXT 1/119/18 (Cantwell, J.D. Images of War:
British Posters 1939-45
, 1989, Plate 17)

52 ‘Don’t
tell aunty & uncle, or cousin Jane, and certainly not…’

Artist: G. Lacoste

Source: IWM PST 3733

53 ‘A
maiden loved…’

Date: c.1939

Artist: G. Lacoste

Source: IWM PST 3417

54 ‘The
Silent Column’

Source: McLaine, I. Ministry of Morale: Home Front
Morale and the Ministry of Information in World War Two
, 1979,
Plate 3

55 ‘Hello
boy friend, coming MY way?’

Date: 1943-44

Artist: Reginald Mount

Size: 137/8” x 91/4

Source: IWM PST 0800 (Cantwell, J.D. Images of War: British
Posters 1939-45
, 1989, Plate 35)

56 ‘Here
comes the bride’

Date: 1942-44

Artist: Reginald Mount

Printer: W.R. Royle and Son Ltd.

Size: 91/2” x 14″

Source: IWM PST 3417

57 ‘Tomorrow’s
Citizen’

Printer: Henry Hildesley Ltd., London

Size: 91/2” x 14″

Source: IWM PST 3416

58 ‘We’re
playing one ‘man’ short -and that’s YOU!’
(Rejected design)

Source: H.M.S.O. Persuading the People, 1995,
between pp44-45

59 ‘We’re
playing one ‘man’ short -and that’s YOU!’

Source: H.M.S.O. Persuading the People, 1995,
between pp44-45

60 ‘Be
in the fashion – cover your hair’

Artist: Initialled ‘aR’

Printer: Loxley Bros Ltd., London

Source: IWM PST 3678

61 ‘She’s
in the ranks too!’
(Rejected design)

Source: H.M.S.O. Persuading the People, 1995,
between pp76-77

62 ‘Women
wanted for evacuation service’

Date: 1939

Artist: Jack Matthew

Source: IWM PST 5873

63 ‘If
only they’d tell us all what to do.’

Date: 1942

Artist: Fougasse

Source: Briggs, S. Keep Smiling Through, 1975, p94

If you wish to cite from this page, please use the following citation:

Lewis, R.M., ‘List of Pictorial Illustrations, Undergraduate Thesis: The planning, design and reception of British home front propaganda posters of the Second World War’, <URL>, written April 1997, accessed Enter Date Here

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