In Search of the Better 'Ole - Captain Bruce Bairnsfather (1887-1959)

Captain Bruce Bairnsfather (BB) was the most famous cartoonist of The First World War. His cartoons of the soldiers and their life in the trenches, in which he served himself in Belgium, made them and the Nation laugh. But because he showed the men and the battlefields as they really were - dirty, generally fed-up and surrounded by the destruction caused by shelling - the Establishment disapproved of his work and he was never formally recognised.

29 September 2009 is the 50th Anniversary of Bairnsfather's death. In a next post, I'll tell more about this event. I recommend to read his biography, written by Mr en Mrs Holt, whom I had the pleasure to meet last week in Ypres.

from left to right:
Dominiek Dendooven (In Flanders Fields Museum Staff),
me, Valmai and Tonie - 1 April 2009

Captain Bruce Bairnsfather of the Royal Warwickshire Regiment created what is probably the most famous and most copied cartoon of all time ¬'The Better 'Ole' -which is featured on the cover of this book.
Bairnsfather drew cartoons to amuse his soldiers and to keep up their and his spirits in the mud and cold of Flanders. His drawings were published in the Bystander magazine and became an instant success, selling in hundreds of thousands and making nations laugh. His effect on the morale of the Tommy was such that other countries such as France, Italy, America, Australia and Canada asked that he should visit their lines and draw their men too, while the British Secret Service considered using him for propaganda purposes.
The Bystander organization marketed Bairnsfather's work much as popular TV programmes and films are promoted today. There were special editions, collected editions, prints and postcards. Grimwades, the pottery people, produced plates and cups, teapots and cheese dishes, and busts of Bairnsfather's most popular character, Old Bill, were made in pottery and in metal as car mascots. All of these are sought today by enthusiastic collectors around the world.
Bairnsfather wrote many books and plays and worked with Charles Cochran, Seymour Hicks, Sydney Chaplain and John Mills and his films were seen in Britain and America.
When the Second World War began he was virtually ignored by the British Establishment. The Americans, however, had taken him to their hearts and he lectured all over the USA including at the famous Carnegie Hall. Thus he was appointed as the official cartoonist to the USAAF and wore their uniform.
This is the roller-coaster story of Bruce Bairnsfather and his character Old Bill- the ones 'who won the war' according to General Sir Ian Hamilton - how they began, how they became one, how Old Bill both sustained and destroyed his creator in his search for the Better 'Ole.
Bairnsfather had always said that Old Bill had just evolved but in this new edition the authors identify the real Old Bill and find his name on the Menin Gate Memorial in Ypres, Belgium, barely twelve kilometres from where Bairnsfather drew his his first cartoons.

Text: from the dust jacquet of the Bairnsfather biography 'In Search of the Better 'Ole by Tonie and Valmai Holt. (ISBN 08050527643 - 288 p, 2001 edition)

You can buy the book at:
http://www.guide-books.co.uk/
Site of Tonie and Valmai Holt, BB biographers and BB collectors



Learn more:
related article: WW1 in cartoons
http://www.bb4h4h.co.uk/
The BB commemoration site (more information about this in a next post)
http://www.brucebairnsfather.org.uk/index.htm
The official BB site by Mark Warby
http://www.brucebairnsfather.com/
Site by BB collector Joe Bristow

http://www.gutenberg.org/files/25951/25951-h/25951-h.htm
Free BB e-book – lots of cartoons from Fragments from France (WW1)
Inspiration for making BB-based cartoons.
http://users.skynet.be/micheldewitte/Bairnsfather/index.htm
BB site by Michel Dewitte (Belgium)

The Best of Fragments from France by Capt.Bruce Bairnsfather

I was very happy to receive, last week, a copy of the 2009 edition of "The best of Fragments from France", compiled and edited by Tonie and Valmai Holt. As you can find out on the Bruce Bairnsfather tribute site BB4H4H there are a series of events to come on 29 September and 3 October, to commemorate the 50th anniversary of his death in 1959.

From the beginning I was very enthusiast for the project and spread the news among cartoonists and cartoon lovers. Thanks again to Liza Donnelly, Ludo Goderis, Bert Vanoystaeyen, Jacques Sandron, Jacri, Philippe Bossens ,Kurt Vangheluwe, Cost, Toon Beuckels, Patrick Heymans and Robert to provide us one or more BB tribute cartoons. The cartoons selected for the auction and those that are published in the book can be found on the BB site. Most cartoons that weren't selected for the book will of course be shown on the exhibition in Warneton.

I'll inform you on the events of 29 September and 3 October with an article on our blog later on.

There is a first review of the book on the site of publisher Pen and Sword Books:

Bruce Bairnsfather (BB) was the most famous cartoonist of the First World War and his soldier characters Old Bill, Bert and Alf, faced with sardonic good humour everything that the Germans, the mud and their officers could throw at them. However, Bruce (known by some as ‘The Man Who Won the War’) never received the acclaim that he deserved for the morale boost that his cartoons gave to the troops at the front and to the people back at home. The 50th Anniversary of Bairnsfather’s death on 29 September 2009 offered an opportunity to redress the balance, and acknowledging it in combination with raising funds for Help for Heroes (H4H) seemed to be most appropriate.

The cartoons reproduced in this collection were originally drawn for The Bystander, a popular weekly magazine, in which they appeared each Tuesday throughout most of the Great War. Their effect on the public was totally unexpected, and so dramatic that Bystander sales soared. The organisation, with unerring good judgement, decided it had a winner in Bairnsfather, and published the first 43 of his cartoons in an anthology. It was produced in February 1916, given the name Fragments from France and sold for 1s. On the front cover was a coloured print of The Better ‘Ole which soon became, and was to remain, the most loved of all Bairnsfather’s cartoons. The authors own the original. Sales quickly reached a quarter of a million and a second anthology was published, More Fragments from France. It was described on the title page as ‘Vol II’ and the price was still 1s. The cartoon on the

cover was What time do they feed the sea lions? In this volume The Bystander launched the first of a series of imaginative marketing exercises, similar to modern promotional methods.

The full extent of the proliferation of the cartoons on all manner of products, from playing cards to pottery, is described in our Bairnsfather biography. Soon Still More Fragments from France were clamoured for, and, with an

eye to the future, more the booklet was labelled No. 3 on the cover, Vol III on the title page.

The success of the Fragments magazines was such that edition followed edition in rapid succession and at least eleven editions were published. The covers retained the same cartoon but were reproduced in different colours, both of board and ink — green, blue, red, grey, fawn and mauve. In America Putnam’s issued Nos. I-IV as one volume and parts V and VI separately. Various hard and leather-bound collections were offered for sale by The Bystander, and the drawings were sold separately as prints and “Portfolios” for framing. They were also printed in colour as give-aways for Answers magazine.

Leafing through these pages, the reader will soon understand their tremendous popularity and success which have withstood the test of time.

Read more:

CAPTAIN BRUCE BAIRNSFATHER AND HELP FOR HEROES

COMMEMORATION OF THE 50TH ANNIVERSARY OF THE DEATH OF CAPTAIN BRUCE BAIRNSFATHER - Site

Book review and possibility to pre-order and buy

More about Bairnsfather on our blog (previous posts and links)

Captain Bruce Bairnsfather exhibition in Plugstreet (Sept 19 - Dec 24 2014)

A few weeks ago I got this kind invitation:

Mr. Gilbert DELEU, Mayor,
Mr. Didier VANDESKELDE, Chairman of "Plugstreet 14-18 experience", Deputy Mayor for Cultural Affairs,
Mr. Luc DE GEEST, Deputy Mayor for Tourism,

are delighted to invite you to the lecture proposed by Tonie and Valmai HOLT, and the inauguration of temporary exhibition "Captain Bruce Bainrsfather, the Creator of Old Bill and the Better 'Ole".

Last Friday I attended the excellent lecture given by Tonie and Valmai Holt. We all learned some interesting facts about the artist and his character Old Bill. Tonie showed us some trench and other maps to locate the places, farms and cottages  where Bruce Bairnsfather (BB) spent his time during his short stay in Belgium and where he was a witness of the Plugstreet Christmas Truce in December 1914.

I was delighted to hear that the famous BB, until the end of his life in 1959, was a very kind, amiable and cordial person. So are Tonie and Valmai Holt who gave the lecture. I was happy to see them again after we met in 2009 to commemorate the 50th anniversary of the dead of BB.  The temporary exhibition shows a (small) part of the impressive BB collection owned by Tonie and Valmai: Grim wades, trench art, glass slides, jigsaw puzzles, cards, postcards, prints, magazines, etc.

Surprise of the evening was the unveiling of... the original Better Ole cartoon. A top of the art collector's item and a masterpiece of BB: the most famous cartoon of WWI.

Valmai with original Better Ole cartoon

If you like the work of Bruce Bairnsfather, then follow this tips:

1. learn more about BB on our blog or on Mark Warby's  BB website

2. like The Bruce Bairnsfather Society on Facebook (you can even join in)

3. fill in the petition to give Bruce Bairnsfather the recognition he deserves for his immeasurable contribution to boosting morale during WW1. The petition has been started by Tonie and Valmai Holt, who are proposing that a leading member of the Government should make a statement in the House that Bairnsfather's contribution during the war should be retrospectively recognised.

http://www.ipetitions.com/petition/the-captain-bruce-bairnsfather-recognition-2

before the lecture, I took this picture at Prowse Point cemetary

Bullets and Billets

A few weeks ago I bought the autobiographical book Bullets and Billets (Bruce Bairnsfather, 1916) on the annual WWI and WWII military book fair in Passchendaele (Belgium). In this book Bairsfather tells about his experiences in the trenches around Plugstreet and Ypres (Belgium), places only about 15 miles away from where I live.

In 2014 there will be a WWI cartoon exhibition in the ECC: I will be prepared...

You can find out more about Bruce Bairsfather in previous posts on our blog.

Learn more:

Free online download and e-book (Gutenberg Project)

World War 1 in Cartoons by cartoon historian Mark Bryant

World War I in Cartoons (UK,2006) by dr Mark Bryant:

Front cover: Kaiser WilhemII (1915)

In a previous article I wrote I found this book on a WWI book fair in Passchendaele.
This book by cartoon historian dr Mark Bryant deserves a prominent place on the bookshelf ,not only of the people interested in the Great War, but also of the cartoon collector because of its historical value and interesting point of view to approach history through the eyes of cartoonists and illustrators.
In the book are many cartoons of Bruce Bairnsfather, a cartoonist I didn't knew before (shame on me!). Visit the Bruce Bairnsfather site and you'll be convinced of his great talent.

"Well if you knows of a better 'ole, go to it!" (1915)
by Bruce Bairnsfather, one of the most famous cartoons
of the Great War

This is the book's summary I've read on the dust jacket:

In an age before TV and radio - and long before the coming of the internet and personal computers - the impact of cartoons and caricature was considerable,especially when the only sources of information and commentary were silent cinema newsreels, posters, newspapers and books - all largely black-and-white. So, not surprisingly, the Great War of 1914-1918 proved an extraordinarily fertile time for artists working in this field.To a news-hungry public, anxious about world affairs, it was the cartoon, with its immediacy and universal accessiblility -even to the barely literate- that could speak the message mere words could never convey. And in times of stress it is laughter that is often the best medicine

When Zeppelins blackened the sky,U-boats challenged the Royal Navy's supremacy at sea, and huge 'Big Bertha' guns shelled the muddy fields of Flanders, it was the antics of Captain Bruce Bairnsfather's immortal 'Old Bill' and the drawings of H.M. Bateman, Bert Thomas and others that kept up Britan's spirits and reassured the troops that all was well back home in dear old 'Blightly'. And who could take Kaiser Bill, Admiral Von Tirpitz, the Red Baron and all the mighty goose-stepping Prussians at all seriously when Allied cartoonists cocked a snook at all they held dear? The pages of Punch and its rivals in Britain, Europe, Russia, Japan and the USA made certain that, whatever was happening militarily, their reader's laughter guaranteed that is was never quiet for long on the Western Front.


The Central Powers also had a wealth of talent labouring to counteract the Allies' propaganda machine and prewar satirical journals such as Simplicissimus in Germany, ass well as others in Turkey, Bulgaria and the Austro-Hungarian Empire, rose to the challenge.
But cartoons of this, or any other period, are not necessarily lighthearted and the Great War gave rise to many vicious and hate-filled drawing on both sides - indeed the gruesome anti-German cartoons by Louis Raemaekers were even deemed powerful enough to call Holland's neutrality into question.

World War I in Cartoons is divided into chapters covering the war year-by-year, each chapter prefaced with a concise introduction thad provides a historical framework for the cartoons of that year. Altogether more than 300 drawings from both sides of the conflict, in colour and black-and-white, have been skilfully blended to produce a unique visual history of the great war.

Learn more:
The official Bruce Bairnsfather site by Mark Warby - recommended!
Publisher Grubstreet.co.uk

Cartoonbook file

Scherper edition December 2009 and Bairnsfather

Old Bill and me

For the readers of Scherper - December 2009:

Link the photos of the Bruce Bairnsfather ceremony , 4 October 2009

Link to the BB tribute cartoons, sent by Belgian cartoonists and Liza Donnelly (The New Yorker)

Below are the Belgian cartoons that were auctioned on 29 September in London:

Ludo Goderis:

Van Bruce Bairnsfather tribute cartoons

Philippe Bossens:

Michel Sandron:

Bert Vanoystaeyen:

Liza Donnelly (The New Yorker):

Christian Jacot:

Kurt Vangheluwe:


Read more - previous BB articles on this blog:

Bruce Bairnsfather 1
The Best of Fragments from France
In search of the better 'ole

Armistice Day 2010 - Brushes and Bayonets : Cartoons, Sketches and Paintings of World War I

With her book 'Brushes and Bayonets' (Osprey UK, 2008) Lucinda Gosling pays tribute to the magnificent artists, cartoonists and painters who illustrated the Great War. The pictures were originally published in The Illustrated London News.

I bought this book in preparation of a WW1 cartoon exhibition in the ECC and it's a reference work, just as is Mark Bryant's WWI in Cartoons.

The book has its own website with reviews, links and even pictures of the book launch in the Cartoon Museum in London. To me this is a very good idea to present a book and  it makes the effort for me to present it to you far more easy.

This is what we read on the back of the book:

"It is often said that a picture is worth a thousand words, but, during World War I, newspaper illustrations were worth even more, not only conveying the news to anxious families at home and soldiers in battle, but also entertaining and lifting the spirits of a nation at war.

Featuring work by some of the most well-known illustrators of the period fromW. Heath Robinson to Bruce Bairnsfather, this thematic collection of 250 WorldWar I magazine illustrations is published in association with The Illustrated London News (the British Harper's).

The illustrations included range from light-hearted strip cartoons and line drawings, to poignant sketches and dark and hard-hitting political satire. The images not only depict events as they happened, but reveal all the moods of a nation at war. Many are published here for the first time in 90 years, creating a unique, bittersweet portrayal of the Great War and a fascinating and very human, historical and artistic reference source."

Read more:
Brushes and Bayonets website
Armistice Day Passchendaele article
WWI in Cartoons by Mark Bryant

Bruce Bairnsfather
Louis Raemaekers

Fragments From France and The Old Bill Newsletter

Last Monday I bought seven Fragments From France at  the WWI book fair in Passchendaele. In fact the the full series was one package, but I already had number four. I made a deal with the seller and I think I paid a fair and good price for it.

And  if  you really like Bairnfather, you can join the Bruce Bairnsfather Society... or just like it on Facebook:

Facebook/TheBruceBairnsfatherSociety/timeline

All eight Fragments :

Learn more:
Bruce Bairnsfather

Bruce Bairnsfather Book and Auction 29/9/2009 and 3/10/2009

Thanks Mike for your BB article on your great blog "Mike Lynch Cartoons"

Please visit:

http://mikelynchcartoons.blogspot.com/2009/09/bruce-bairnsfather-charity-auction-and.html

and of course:

www.bb4h4h.co.uk