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Posters from the Great War

Jennyann, Some of these posters were responsible after the war finished for the outpouring of grief that swept the Nation.
Parents, wives, girlfriends friends and neighbours all who persuaded them to go,influenced by these posters must have suffered terrible when they never came back.
 
Cromwell, I think the nurse and soldier poster is trying to portray that both sexes are doing their duty for the country, she by taking up nursing and him by joining the army. How do others see it?
 
Sylvia, the poster sent a different message to me. The nurse and the soldier are in each other arms. If the poster was portraying nurses and soldiers joining up I don't think they ought to have been portrayed like that unless something else was to be read into it.
I could be quite wrong, of course, because the nurse could have been saying farewell to a soldier whom she had nursed. Interested what others see in this.
 
A few mirrors were used in the recruitment campaign to push home the message "Its you we want"
 
The poster campaign went on relentless and each poster was looked at like the page of a comic silently telling you to join the great adventure were You could save Belgium, seek revenge and restore justice to the World. But what other way could they have got recruitment ? with no TV and very few folk read the newspapers.
 
You filled out ya postcards (more soul stirring propaganda) and posted them in a letterbox with a recruiting poster on
Three Great War postcards
 
Looks like they ran a very good poster campaign overall. You couldn't avoid seeing them
as you carried on your day to day life. If you didn't see them everywhere then your friends and family surely would have and the pressure would go on. Great poster Cromwell.
 
Jennyann I have just discovered that they ran competitions in the schools to see who could come up with the best poster's and outside the Town Hall in Brum they made a massive thermometer and were the "Mercury" went up  was an arrow which told you how many men had joined that day and the figures were changed daily by the boy scouts.Birmingham held the record for the most recruits 28,512
Very rare pic of a poster being painted
 
I don't think many Birmingham citizens these days realize that Brum recruited the
most soldiers to fight in WW1. The Government wanted as many men as they could get and the Goal Thermometer for recruits outside the Town Hall was there to inspire recruits to sign up . It's bizarre and yet it worked. I wonder how many came back from those long ago campaigns. I don't think many of the men who signed up had any idea what was ahead. No wonder it was called The War to End all Wars.....even though it didn't turn out to be that way. So many men's lives snuffed out in senseless warfare. My Uncle Bill, who lost his life in September 1915, lost many of his friends from school in Witton before he himself was killed.
 
Sylvia, Thats me not thinking, Scarborough was heavily shelled by the German Navy on  16th December 1914 A battle cruiser and an armoured cruiser fired 50 shots at the town killing  men women and children 16 in total with just over 100 people injured it was not fortified and was of no military value to  the Germans, but it did boost the recruitment figures as we were being directly attacked they also shelled Hartlepool and Whitby
I have a lot of genuine photographs of the attack that took place showing all the damage but this post  is about posters which I am trying to stick to but I tend to drift of the track a bit. but as long as I get back on I guess I am OK
At Hartlepool over 170 civilians were killed and 21 sailorswere killed
We were also bombed by Zeppelins
100's were killed by bombing from airships etc. in 1918 the printing works of Oldhams Press was wrecked by an aerial torpedo killing 46 people and as many injured who were taking shelter in the basement of the building
 
Here is a Silver wound badge which had a unique number stamped on the back which was also on the paperwork that went with it, so no two badges had the same number.
Issued to discharged soldiers who had been wounded.
To wear while out and about in mufti (civilian clothing) so they would not be harassed by recruiting agents or given white feather by the women. if you was caught wearing one which you were not entitled to you could face up to a year in prison
 
Cromwell i was not aware that our shores were attacked by enemy ships during WW1. I go to Whitby a lot i will do some research on my next visit.
Love to see the photos of Scarborough when your not busy.
 
The Poster Campaign went on at an alarming rate and everyone was targeted. It was the one thing that played a enormous part in stimulating recruiting.The most famous one of the whole of the war was the Kitchener one, Painted by Alfred Leete were he is looking at you and pointing his finger "Your Country needs You" it seemed to have had a magical effect on the whole of the civil population inevitably sending a personal shudder up the spine of every slacker who saw it on every hoarding.
Other recruiting methods were the "White Feather"technique, Women,on seeing a man in civilian clothing spoke to them as on a Flag Day asking not for money but for their lives and begging them to join up, if they refused they were given the traditional White Feather for cowardice.
Dreadful mistakes were made; the unfit were victimized and secret service workers were insulted.One man who was given a White Feather said "I'll use that to clean my pipe as thats the second decoration I have had today " "The King gave me this only this morning " and he pulled the V.C. out of his pocket to show them.
Bottom Photo shows Women Recruiters harrassing the men in a park
 
Not all poster went down well with the public, here is one that tried to copy the famous Kitchener poster but failed miserable and was withdrawn

The bottom poster I find quite really in bad taste as the chap thats shunned in the park might have to look after all his family, he could be ill, or a multitude of reasons why he did not enlist.quite a shocking poster
 
The way the war was being fought made the Government think in terms of Conscription so poster's started to go up telling people to enlist as you will have no choice once your name is called.
Trying to ram home the message "You are needed now !"
 
People today have a hard time working out why two and a half million men actually volunteered to fight in the Great War and it was only in the last year of the war the numbers were maintained by conscripted men which started in Jan.1916 when a Bill was passed which called up all unmarried men for service, and it was not long after that another bill got passed calling up married men as well
 
It was not just street posters that stared down on everyone all the national and regional newspapers ran
along putting full page posters in all the newspapers so folk could cut them out and put up in the windows etc.
I have just spent a few hours going through a pile of Daily Sketch's dated all from 1914 and all have the same message that would not be allowed today,I have scanned a piece and marked in yellow what very likely started the white feather craze
Both cuttings these came out of the Daily Sketch Thu.Nov.12th 1914 which I have
 
Cartoon from the same newspaper sending a sinister message to the reader
 
This Cartoon published the following week shows how they made light of the standards being lowered
perhaps that is why you had so many underage lads joining up, as believe it or not you did not need your birth certificate you just told them how old you was and you were in the army,gun in ya hand and shipped to France to fight (not quite that quick) after a 3-6 month training period
It comes across that I am being unpatriotic. But I am not at all. If I was a youngster at the time I would have been one of the first to join up. You could not have held me back. The government of the time had no choice but to do the poster campaign the way they did, in an era that there was no TV, half the population could not read or write or had no access to radio all that they had where the posters, and a picture says more than a thousand words. The country was faced with a dire threat, and urgent not thought out action was needed.
But what would you have done to solve the situation that we were in?
 
BSA Workers in Cannon Hill Park in Sept. 1918 campaigning for "Win the War" all happy smiling faces but 3 months later they all were out of a job as the war came to an end and were soon faced with the prospect of mass unemployment as the soldiers came home.
Britain was faced then with the greatest slump in her History and for year 1920 the Government had to raise over £1,340,000,000 just to keep the country going and we sank into the darkest years in peacetime time leading up to the General Strike in 1926......... but thats another story
 
Sugarpuffs I have the compete set of The New Edition of War Illustrated what all the Web site came from as well as the old editions,Wonderful Books  but better still is The Illustrated War News which have far better photo's in so lets hope they do a websight for those as well
One of the best Web sites on the Net about The Great War is Tom Morgans site
https://www.hellfire-corner.demon.co.uk/
 
cromwell.you've came up with another good site.god bless everyone who served for this country.
 
:angel: Hartlepool took a great pounding (No pun intended.‚.. :2funny:) in WW1 as Crommie has stated, however one must not get mixed up between Hartlepool on the coast and West hartlepool which is a little further inland (the town was split into two parts in those days). A number of my Husbands family were involved, they are all very old Sea faring families and have lived in the area for generations. It is one of the very oldest seaports in Britain and was a closed community for many years until the industrial revolution and West Hartlepool was built.
We know one or two of the Pounder family were wounded in Hartlepool and other members:
Hunter, Margaret Ann (47) 11, Bridge Street
Hunter, Samuel Hall (16) 1, Alexander Terrace, Hart Lane
Corner, Bridget (39) 4, Dock Street
were killed in West Hartlepool in the attacks.

Shells fell on homes, killing or seriously wounding the people inside. Others killed were caught by surprise on the streets. Up to this point none of the local people knew what was happening and thought that the noise was either the battery practicing, or a naval battle out at sea. Many were having their breakfast, and getting ready to start the day. The first civilian fatality was reported to be Hilda Horsley, a 17-year-old tailoress, who was on her way to work.

Reasons for the attack and the Brave Defence of our Island

Germany had recently lost a battle with the British Navy in the South Atlantic. The Germans now needed a successful mission to boost morale at home. Germany's intention was to attack the north-east coast of England..‚.. The Hartlepools were a good target because of their shipyards and engine works, which were important to the British war effort. Also the towns were only about 330 nautical miles across the North Sea from the small island of Heligoland, where the German Fleet was stationed (a nautical mile is equal to 1852 m, or 6076 ft)..‚.. It was possible for ships to cover this distance under cover of darkness during the long winter nights.
A flotilla of ships was sent from Germany towards the coast. As weather conditions in the North Sea worsened, the smaller ships returned home, leaving five larger ships to complete the journey. The Derfflinger and the Von Der Tann headed towards Scarborough and Whitby, where their shells damaged many buildings, and killed over twenty civilians. The other three ships headed towards Hartlepool.
The three German ships were the battle cruisers Seydlitz and Moltke, and the older, armoured cruiser, Blucher. They had much larger guns than the defending guns on the Hartlepool Batteries. The warships fired 1150 shells (some up to 11 in., or 27 cm, in diameter) into the Hartlepools. The two coastal defence batteries on the Heugh managed to return fire with 123 shells, the largest of which was 6 in.(15 cm) in diameter.
The Heugh (pronounced "Yuff") Gun Battery is located on the ancient Headland area of Hartlepool. On December 16th 1914, along with the nearby Lighthouse Battery (now sadly demolished), it engaged the three marauding German battleships in shore-to-ship combat. Manning it were men of the 5th Company Durham Royal Garrison Artillery, supported by the recently raised 18th Battalion Durham Light Infantry. It was the only British coastal battery to see action against a naval bombardment in the entire Great War, and also marks the spot where the first soldiers perished from enemy fire on home soil since the English Civil War. The raid would cost the lives of 118 people, another 400 were wounded, some suffering horrific injuries and fuel recruitment for years to come.
.‚.. as Crommie also pointed out.

The damage
The Germans' intention was to cause as much damage as possible to the shipbuilding and engineering works, which were a prime target during wartime. They also hit the gasworks, with the result that no one in either town had any lighting or heating that night or for some time afterwards. By the time the German ships left large areas of the Headland and West Hartlepool had been destroyed.

Pom :angel:
Portrait of Lt Col Robson, officer in charge of the batteries during the bombardment.
2 of the streets after the attack.
The battle cruiser Seydlitz, during the bombardment of the Hartlepools.
 
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Nice piece Chris, I might have some photo's of the areas you mentioned as I have about 30 good pics
And if you want them in large format I will email them to you
 
:angel: Thanx Graham, I only know so much about the area and the attack, 'cause Col's Dad remembered the attack well and told me about it before he died in 1974. He was born in Hartlepool in 1905 and came to NZ after a long seafaring career that started from the age of 14yrs. He and his brother's and sister's were in an orphage after their father was drowned off the North Coast around 1909. He was a self taught man which I think was due to being long hours and weeks at sea. He was also a very well read man, full of information, a great story teller and was able to hold every one's interest. He had seen lots of changes in the world during his lifetime and traveled all over it too.

And yes please could I have the Pic's Thanx again.

Pom :angel:
 
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