He's Happy & Satisfied/Are You?
Artist
Designer Unknown
Date1915
Dimensions29 1/2 x 19 1/4 in. (74.9 x 48.9 cm)
ClassificationsPoster
Credit LineGift of Peter A. Blatz
Object numberPH.188
DescriptionThis simple illustrated poster by an artist known only by the initials “O.R.” featuring a smiling British soldier was part of a huge government campaign involving both posters and the new medium of film to encourage enlistment after war broke out in August 1914. (A similar image by the same artist also appears in a poster issued the same year, 1915, by the Parliamentary Recruiting Office in London; see Imperial War Museum, London.) At this point, the country’s standing army consisted of only 250 thousand men. The campaign was led by Lord Herbert Kitchener, Secretary of State for War, who ultimately organized British armies on a previously unknown scale. However, by January 1916, it was clear that the voluntary recruits could not keep up with the mounting casualties, and the Military Service Act imposed conscription on most single men aged 18 to 41. On View
Not on view
